Being spoon-fed rosy-hued misinformation by the authorities was no more than people had come to expect—and preemptively discount. They only got suspi… - Iain Banks

What is all your studying worth, all your learning, all your knowledge, if it doesn’t lead to wisdom? And what’s wisdom but knowing what is right, and what is the right thing to do?

I think," she said carefully, "that perhaps too many people want things to be simple when they are not and cannot be. Encouraging that desire is seductive and rewarding, but also dangerous.

They are. But in Special Circumstances we deal in the moral equivalent of black holes, where the normal laws — the rules of right and wrong that people imagine apply everywhere else in the universe — break down; beyond those metaphysical event horizons, there exist . . . special circumstances.” She smiled. “That’s us. That’s our territory; our domain.” “To some people,” he said, “that might sound like just a good excuse for bad behavior.