Grisel Weston

“The old guard believe in that code because they came to it the hard way. They raise their children to believe in that code—but their children believe it for entirely different reasons."
"They believe it," the Constable said, "because they have been indoctrinated to believe it."
"Yes. Some of them never challenge it—they grow up to be small minded people, who can tell you what they believe but not why they believe it. Others become disillusioned by the hypocrisy of the society and rebel—as did Elizabeth Finkle-McGraw."
"Which path do you intend to take, Nell?" said the Constable, sounding very interested. "Conformity or rebellion?"
"Neither one. Both ways are simple-minded—they are only for people who cannot cope with contradiction and ambiguity.”
― Neal Stephenson, The Diamond Age: Or, a Young Lady's Illustrated Primer

“no one seemed to be thinking about how the “scandal” was affecting the lives of WE Charity’s beneficiaries. Her constant refrain was “The biggest loss was to the children.”
― Tawfiq S. Rangwala, What WE Lost: Inside the Attack on Canada’s Largest Children’s Charity

“When you play around with or entertain a “young lion,” what you don’t end up killing and putting away from you now will end up killing you: because when it’s full-grown it becomes the lion or dragon that Psalm 91:13 describes. That’s how the enemy gets his way to build strongholds in your life.”
― John Ramirez, Unmasking the Devil: Strategies to Defeat Eternity's Greatest Enemy

“That was how you survived. See the world as it is. Not as you think it is. Not as you want it to be, or think it should be. Not even as it was yesterday. See it exactly as it is, right now.”
― Barry Kirwan, When the children come