But work used to be the lot of every man, and now it is rapidly becoming an aristocratic privilege. Men nowadays are more often paid not to work. - Colleen McCullough

There is a legend about a bird which sings only once in it's life, more beautifully than any other creature on the face of the earth. From the moment it leaves it's nest, it searches for a thorn tree, and does not rest until it has found one. Then, it impales it's breast on the longest, sharpest thorn. But as it is dying, it rises above it's own agony to outsing the Lark and the Nightingale. The Thornbird pays it's life for that one song, and the whole world stills to listen, and God in his heaven smiles, as it's best is brought only at the cost of great pain; Driven to the thorn with no knowledge of the dying to come. But when we press the thorn to our breast, we know, we understand.... and still, we do it.

The shock of having to pull herself up in the midst of a spontaneous reaction — I must remember to tell Dane about this, he’ll get such a kick out of it — that was what hurt the most. And because it kept on occurring so often, it prolonged the grief.

Caesar’s kindnesses are conscious, done for Caesar’s benefit, and Caesar no longer sees the world as a place wherein magical things can occur. Because they can’t. Men and women ruin it with their impulses, desires, thoughtlessness, lack of intelligence and cupidity.