Now there was sophistry. A mage was a perilous beast, but a mage who was also a logician and a theologian was deadly enough to outface the devil hims… - Judith Tarr

Gerbert recognized quality in the plainness of the woman’s robe, and in the carving of a lintel, and in the hanging of a rug on a whitewashed wall. The only magic in it was the alchemy of taste.

I would tell you that the West is sadly fallen. What men knew once, they know no longer, nor want to know. It is all iron and edged blades, and lord smiting lord for a fistful of power. They dream of empires, and they kill for a furlong of wasteland.
"But I, my lord, I want to know what the world is."

"You weren't waiting up for me, were you?"
Gerbert shrugged. "You know how little I sleep. I was contemplating my sins."
"Sleep will do you more good."