“If all we've got to look forward to is disloyalty and treachery, why do we even make friends?""Again, human nature. Hoping for the best is what drives us.”

“I guess we speak pretty loosely, don't we, about looking forward to the Ashes and all that—and we are, but it's not with both eyes. We've got one eye on that and one eye on what we need to get in place to make sure we're the best team we can be for November.”

“Then tell them we've all got meanness in us...But tell them we have some good in us too. And the only thing worth living for is the good. That's why we've got to make sure we pass it on.”

“But what else could we do but hope? that, after all, is human nature.”

“It is human nature. If we surround ourselves with evil, even evil becomes good to us. If we are not careful, that natural light witin us all that teaches us the difference between the two can be snuffed out completely. Even the best of people can fall.”

“No, the secret is that there's no reward and we have to endure our characters and our natures as best we can, because no amount of experience or insight is going to rectify our deficiencies, our self-regard, or our cupidity. We have to learn that our desires do not find any real echo in the world. We have to accept that the people we love do not love us, or not in the way we hope. We have to accept betrayal and disloyalty, and, hardest of all, that someone is finer than we are in character or intelligence.”