“The low bird is not picked tenderly out of the dust by its fellows; rather, it is dispatched quickly and without mercy.”

“The French know the intrinsic value of holding on to the past, its pleasures, its promises, and its tender mercies.”

“In after-years he would tell of an incident that took place at one of their encampments: "We were with the Prophet when a Companion brought in a fledgling that he had caught, and one of the parent birds came and threw itself into the hands of him who had taken its young. I saw men's faces full of wonderment, and the Prophet said: 'Do ye wonder at this bird? Ye have taken its young, and it hath thrown itself down in merciful tenderness unto its young. Yet I swear by God, Your Lord is more merciful unto you than is this bird unto its fledgling. And he told the man to put back the young bird where he had found it. He also said: "God hath a hundred mercies,and one of them hath He sent down amongst jinn and men and cattle and beasts of prey. Thereby they are kind and merciful unto one another, and thereby the wild creature inclineth in tenderness unto her offspring. And ninety-nine mercies hath God reserved unto Himself, that therewith He may show mercy unto His slaves on the day of the Resurrection.”

“When I said that Mercy stoodWithin the borders of the wood,I meant the lenient beast with clawsAnd bloody swift-dispatching jaws.”

“A bird without wings and a man without art are both condemned to wander in low places; they can never soar up to those unrivalled heights.”

“Photography is without mercy--though it's nonsense to say it does not lie. Rather, it lies in a particular, capricious way which makes beggars of ministers and gods of cat's meat men.”