“When one acts on pity against justice, it is the good whom one punishes for the sake of the evil; when one saves the guilty from suffering, it is the innocent whom one forces to suffer. There is no escape from justice, nothing can be unearned and unpaid for in the universe, neither in matter nor in spirit—and if the guilty do not pay, then the innocent have to pay it.”
“It is better to risk saving a guilty person than to condemn an innocent one.”
“Innocent or guilty, a Lannister pays his debts.”
“No good has ever come from feeling guilty, neither intelligence, policy, nor compassion. The guilty do not pay attention to the object but only to themselves, and not even to their own interests, which might make sense, but to their anxieties.”
“There comes atime when one has seen such suffering one begins to understand, in thisworld, even the innocent may be forced to bear the sins of another.”
“No one is innocent after the experience of governing. But not everyone is guilty.”