“You don’t have to test everything to destruction just to see if you make it right.”

“You don't have to test everything to destruction just to see if you made it right.”

“You think wars get started because some duke gets shot, or someone cuts off one’s ear, or someone’s sited their missiles in the wrong place. It’s not like that. That’s just well, just reasons, which haven’t got anything to do with it. What really causes wars is two sides that can’t stand the sight of one another and the pressure builds up and up and then anything will cause it. Anything at all.”

“He didn't say "that's weird". He wouldn't have said "that's weird" if a flock of sheep had cycled past playing violins. It wasn't the sort of thing a responsible engineer said. ”

“Some police forces would believe anything. Not the Metropolitan police, though. The Met was the hardest, most cynically pragmatic, most stubbornly down-to-earth police force in Britain. It would take a lot to faze a copper from the Met. It would take, for example, a huge, battered car that was nothing more nor less than a fireball, a blazing, roaring, twisted metal lemon from Hell, driven by a grinning lunatic in sunglasses, sitting amid the flames, trailing thick black smoke, coming straight at them through the lashing rain and wind at eighty miles an hour.That would do it every time.”

“The road to hell is paved with good intentions. (This is not actually true. The raid to Hell is paved with frozen door-to-door salesman. On weekends, many of the younger demons go ice skating down it.)”

“I don't see what's so triffic about creating people as people and then gettin' upset cos' they act like people", said Adam severely. "Anyway, if you stopped tellin' people it's all sorted out after they're dead, they might try sorting it all out while they're alive.”