“Dr. Breed was mistaken about at least one thing: there was such a thing as ice-nice.”

“Dr. Breed keeps telling me the main thing with Dr. Hoenikker was truth.”“You don’t seem to agree.”“I don’t know whether I agree or not. I just have trouble understandinghow truth, all by itself, could be enough for a person.”

“I don't think he was knowable. I mean, when most people talk about knowing somebody a lot or a little, they're talking about the secrets they've been told or haven't been told. They're talking about intimate things, family things, love things," that nice old lady said to me. "Mr. Hoenikker had all those things in his life, the way every living person has to, but they weren't the main things with him.”

“She turned to examine Dr. Breed, looking at him with helpless reproach. She hated people who thought too much. At that moment, she struck me as an appropriate representative for almost all mankind.”

“Ah, God, what an ugly city Ilium is!'Ah, God,' says Bokonon, 'what an ugly city every city is!'Sleet was falling through a motionless blanket of smog. It was early morning. I was riding in the Lincoln sedan of Dr. Asa Breed. I was vaguely ill, still a little drunk from the night before. Dr. Breed was driving. Tracks of a long-abandoned trolley system kept catching the wheels of his car.Breed was a pink old man, very prosperous, beautifully dressed. His manner was civilized, optimistic, capable. I, by contrast, felt bristly, diseased, cynical. I had spent the night with Sandra.My soul seemed as foul as smoke from burning cat fur.”

“Keeping big secrets, particularly secrets about things of one's own doing, is a tough proposition for even very bright people.”

“A winded, defeated-looking fat woman in filthy coveralls trudged beside us, hearing what Miss Pefko said. She turned to examine Dr. Breed, looking at him with helpless reproach. She hated people who thought too much. At that moment, she struck me as an appropriate representative for almost all mankind.”