If complete and utter chaos was lightning, then he'd be the sort to stand on a hilltop in a thunderstorm wearing wet copper armour and shouting 'All … - Terry Pratchett

"Albert grunted. "Do you know what happens to lads who ask too many questions?"
Mort thought for a moment.
"No," he said eventually, "what?"
There was silence.
Then Albert straightened up and said, "Damned if I know. Probably they get answers, and serve 'em right.

Next comes the realist phase ("After all, from a purely geometrical point of view a cat is only a tube with a door at the top.").

Light thinks it travels faster than anything but it is wrong. No matter how fast light travels it finds the darkness has always got there first, and is waiting for it. <small>(p.230, in the edition published in 1991 by Victor Gollancz, ISBN 0-575-04979-0)</small>