“In the controversy that followed the prince's remarks, his most staunch defender was professor John Taylor, a scholar whose work I had last noticed when he gave good reviews to the psychokinetic (or whatever) capacities of the Israeli conjuror and fraud Uri Geller. The heir to the throne seems to possess the ability to surround himself—perhaps by some mysterious ultramagnetic force?—with every moon-faced spoon-bender, shrub-flatterer, and water-diviner within range.”

“What good was owning the world when he’d have no choice except to defend himself against every person in it? Personally, he’d rather be a beggar with one true friend than a prince surrounded by two-faced assassins.’ (Aiden)”

“His heart is a desert island.... The whole scope, the whole energy of his mind surround and protect him; his depths isolate him and guard him against the truth. He flatters himself that he is entirely alone there.... Patience, dear lady. Perhaps, one day, he will discover some footprint on the sand.... What holy and happy terror, what salutary fright, once he recognizes in that pure sign of grace that his island is mysteriously inhabited!...”

“He himself, he realized, had always been most abominably frightened, even at the height of his divine power, a frail god upon a rickety throne, afraid of opening letters, of making decisions, afraid of the instinctive knowledge in the eyes of mules, of the innocent eyes of good men, of the elastic nature of the passions, even of the devotion he had received from some men, and one woman, and dogs.”

“God didn't give man wings; He gave him the brains and the spirit to give himself wings. Just as He gave us the capacity to laugh when we hurt, or to struggle on when we feel like giving up.I've come to believe that how we choose to live with pain, or injustice, or death...is the true measure of the Divine within us.”

“[he] had learned how to force his mood, to keep himself in the middle ground, neither manic nor hopeless. He seemed a bit lighter in spirit, perhaps because he had less of it. He would find peace, even if it were some compromised brand.”