“If everything I have become were not machine-made I might be able to take the risk of being human with you.”

“There is a reason for everything, Opal. You might not be able to figure it out, and time might have made us all forget it, but the reason is there all the same.”

“If the art of war were nothing but the art of avoiding risks, glory would become the prey of mediocre minds.... I have made all the calculations; fate will do the rest.”

“Certainly for myself I believe I would always wish to know the truth, but then I also wish to never have to face a truth I cannot bear. Being able to look truth in the face might be brave, or it might just mean you have been lucky in the truth you were dealt.”

“You talk as if a god had made the Machine," cried the other. "I believe that you pray to it when you are unhappy. Men made it, do not forget that. Great men, but men. The Machine is much, but not everything.”

“He said that it was very difficult to become an astronaut. I said that I knew. You had to become an officer in the air force and you had to take lots of orders and be prepared to kill other human beings, and I couldn't take orders. Also I didn't have 20/20 vision, which you needed to be a pilot.”