Lukasz

“Math is poetry, kid,” she growled. “Math is sex in the head. All that work of making your mind stroke the
numbers? It’s a natural series of touches you already know by instinct. Once you get over your inhibitions, you
can sit in class or lie in bed and practice formulae and sums, caress the equation till you find the climax of an
elegant solution.”
― Raymond St. Elmo, In Theory, it Works

“But during that time, all the wise scholars and profound thinkers who ran the place fell to brooding on the nature of human society, and came to the conclusion that, left to itself, it didn’t work terribly well. And why? Because, they argued, plausibly enough, it tends to be run by idiots; kings (ruled by their own base desires and hopelessly interbred) or dictators (anyone who seizes power by that very act disqualifies himself from being trusted with it) or oligarchies (irredeemably self-serving and corrupt) or, God help us, democracies (in the republic of the stupid, the half-witted man is prime minister) – there had to be a better way, and to the wisest men in the known world, it was painfully obvious what it was. If a job needs doing, do it ourselves.”
― K.J. Parker, Saevus Corax Deals with the Dead

“You want a defenseless girl to walk home in the near dark?”
“Seriously? The biggest danger in the streets of Theory, Texas is some farmer letting his dog drive the tractor. A lot of the dogs around here drink.”
― Raymond St. Elmo, In Theory, it Works

“Everyone goes on, " he repeated, with a taint of bitter mockery. "Oh, yes. They go on. With crippled spirits and broken ideals, they do go on. And with the passage of years they forget what crippled and broke them. They accept it grandly as they grow older, as if crippling and breaking were gifts from a king. Then those same hopeful spirits and large ideals in younger souls are viewed as stupid, and petty… and things to be crippled and broken, because everyone does go on." He looked into the woman's eyes. "Tell me. What is the point of life, if truth is not worth standing up for? If justice is a hollow shell? If beauty and grace are burnt to ashes, and evil rejoices in the flames? Shall I weep on that day, and lose my mind, or join the rejoicing and lose my soul? Shall I sit in my room? Should I go for a long walk, but where might I go so as not to smell the smoke? Should I just go on, Mrs. Nettles, like everyone else?”
― Robert R. McCammon, Speaks the Nightbird