Iskilip is senile, more than half converted to his own artificial creed. He was mumbling about prophecies Val Nira made long ago, true prophecies. Ba… - Poul Anderson

We need a reserve of life, every kind of life," he explained. "Today for the spirit—a glimpse of space and green. Tomorrow for survival, flat-out survival.

Her rank was higher than his, so high that no one in her family worked productively.

We must understand that what Pascal said is true of every human being in the whole of space-time, ourselves included—“The last act is tragic, however pleasant all the comedy of the other acts. A little earth on our heads, and all is done with forever.”—understand it in our bones, so that we can live with it calmly if not serenely.