The only desire the Culture could not satisfy from within itself was one common to both the descendants of its original human stock and the machines … - Iain Banks

Fate, I tell you, if not the hand of the WorldGod itself…or whatever manipulatory appendage WorldGods possess. Anyway, the hand, metaphorically, of the WorldGod. Possibly."
"I think you underguess the workings of blind chance, sir.

What I know was passed to me by others, and so must surrender the toll which information tends to pay when it passes through the minds and memories of others.

Such a stupid act. Sometimes heroics revolted him; they seemed like an insult to the soldier who weighed the risks of the situation and made calm, cunning decisions based on experience and imagination, the sort of unshowy soldiering that didn’t win medals but wars.