David Eddings Quotes

You're forcing me to violate one of my most sacred vows."
"Oh, I'm sorry. We won't do it that way then. We'll just kill everybody in this part of Kweron instead. You'll be standing waist-deep in blood, but your soul will be all nice and clean. Won't that make you proud?"
"Monstrous!"
"It's entirely up to you, Bheid. You can either be a swindler or a butcher. Take your pick.

Why do men always want to tamper with the natural order of things?
“When something breaks, we fix it, that’s all.”
What gave you the absurd idea that [the world]’s broken?
“It’s not the way it was before, Em. To our way of looking at things, that means that it’s broken.”
[...] Change doesn’t necessarily mean improvement, Althalus. Change is just change. “Better” and “worse” are human definitions. The world changes all the time, and no amount of complaining’s going to stop it from changing.

The theorists make high-minded speeches. Their followers cheer and applaud—briefly—and then they get back to the business of appropriating everything of value.

You don't have to be so apologetic with me, Bheid," Althalus told him. "I'm very tolerant about things like that. I gather that your murderers are on a salary of some kind?" "A yearly retainer with a bonus for each murder, yes." "Then they aren't just assorted fanatics who kill for their God?" "Good heavens no! Fanatics want to be captured and executed. That makes them martyrs, and martyrs are rewarded in heaven. Our assassins are thoroughgoing professionals who never get caught." "Good policy. Never hire amateurs when you can get professionals.

A really good thief shouldn’t have to kill people.

All right, lady, I'm woodsy. So what? If you don't like the way I look, don't look at me. I don't have any parents, and I wear rags because that's all I can find to wear. I don't see where that's any of your business, though. I'm too busy staying alive to worry about how I look, and if you don't like it that way, well, that's just too bad."
Andine was gaping at Gher. "People don't talk to me that way!" she gasped.
"Not to your face, maybe," Gher shot back, "but I think if you'd close your mouth and listen to other people once in a while, you might find out what they really think of you. But you don't want to know, do you? I wasn't raised in a palace the way you were, lady. I grew up in a garbage heap, so I don't have fancy manners."
"I don't have to listen to this!"
"Maybe you don't have to, but you really should. I breathe in and out the same as you do, lady, and you don't own the air, so it belongs to me as much as it does to you. Just back away, lady. You make me even sicker than I make you.

"We don’t believe in your wars, we don’t believe in your customs, and we don’t believe in your Gods.”
“Your lives are empty, then.”
“The money sort of fills that up—at least that’s what Sergeant Khalor told us.”

"This grey’s sort of depressing.”
What on earth has that got to do with anything?
“It’s a question of aesthetics, Em. We should always strive to fill our lives with beauty.”
I don’t see anything beautiful in something that was designed to kill people.
“There’s beauty in everything, Em. You just have to learn to look for it.”
If you’re going to preach at me, I think I’ll just curl up and go back to sleep.

Religion’s based on a desire to know what’s going to happen in the future. Astrologers believe that the stars control that.

The prosperity of all Arum might well hinge upon what we do here in this day... [If] Arum Chiefs are dishonorable men, who will ever come to these sacred mountains again with gold to deal with us? Take less, my sons, that ye may gain more.