David Gemmell Quotes

It would be a fine thing if war could be conducted as a game where no lives were lost. At the end of a battle combatants could meet [...] and drink and talk.

While men compete in war, there will be warriors. While there are warriors, there will be princes among warriors. Among the princes will be kings, and among the kings an emperor.

Only a fool loves war. Or a man who has never seen it. The trouble is that the survivors forget about the horrors and remember only the battle lust. They pass on that memory, and other men hunger for it.

This enterprise was doomed, but we do what we can and do what we must. So a young farmer with wife and children decides to go home. Good! He shows a sense that you and I will never understand. They will sing songs about us, but he will ensure that there are people to sing them. He plants. We destroy.

I don't know yet whether I fully believe in fate, but certain things do happen in a man's life that he cannot explain.

Some people are born ugly. It's not their fault, and I for one have never held it against a man that he is ugly. but others — and I count myself among them — are born with handsome features. That's a gift that should not be lightly taken away.

In any broth, the scum always rises to the top.

The very odd thing about sagas [...] is that they very rarely mention dry mouths and full bladders.

Some of you are probably thinking that you may panic and run. You will not! Others are worried about dying. Some of you will. But all men die. No one ever gets out of this life alive.

Life is nothing unless death has been faced down.

You may think life is sweet now, but when death is a heartbeat away then life becomes unbearably desirable. And when you survive, everything you do will be enhanced and filled with greater joy: the sunlight, the breeze, a good wine, a woman's lips, a child's laughter.

All men have talents. Some build, some paint, some write, some fight. For me it is different.

[H]e who fears to lose will never win.

All beauty is sad. For it fades.

I understand why some men become soldiers: to protect the nation and all that. But a whole race of people living to be soldiers seems … unhealthy. Does that sound right?<p>"Indeed it sounds right. But the northern steppes make poor farmland. Mainly they breed goats and ponies. Any luxuries they desire, they must steal.