“[T]he obverse of facile emotion in the 14th century was a general insensitivity to the spectacle of pain and death.”

“The boy was not insensitive, he knew; but he had the facility and self-confidence that came of looking at fate not as a master but as an equal.”

“For belligerent purposes, the 14th century, like the 20th, commanded a technology more sophisticated than the mental and moral capacity that guided its use.”

“Generally speaking, it is Pisces who provides most of the emotional input into your relationship but that doesn’t mean The Goat is unfeeling or insensitive. Moreover, it is the Fish who provides the extreme highs and low in your relationship and, strangely enough, it is this rollercoaster ride that helps Pisces cope with the monotony and routine and control that is the Goat’s preferred way of living.”

“He was right. And he was an insensitive shit.”

“[T]he astonishing purity of pain, how it will not be mixed with any other sensation.”