“By repetition, each lie becomes an irreversible fact upon which other lies are constructed.”

“Repetition does not transform a lie into a truth.”

“For us to maintain our way of living, we must tell lies to each other and especially to ourselves. The lies are necessary because, without them, many deplorable acts would become impossibilities.”

“The central importance of entering worlds other than our own lies in the fact that the experience leads us to understand that our own world is also a cultural construct. By experiencing other worlds, then, we see our own for what it is and are thereby enabled also to see fleetingly what the real world, the one between our own cultural construct and those other worlds, must in fact be like.”

“What if others-adults-had, upon becoming Twelves, received in their instructions the same terrifying sentence? What if they had all been instructed: You may lie?”

“Through . . . lies you try to run your life and manipulate others. . . . Lies become an inhibitor in your relationship . . . .”