“The complete reverse was so often the case that he had come to think of it as a kind of natural law.”

“A new respect for Nature had been learned, a new kinship with sun and water and soil....They had learned that while Nature is often beautiful and kind, her laws must be respected, for they are ruthless and inexorable as well. Man must accept these laws and adjust his way of living to them. Then only can he prosper.”

“It seemed as though he had for a soul the book of the natural law.”

“A miracle to confound natural law, a baffling reversal of the inevitable consequences . . . a miracle. . . . An act of high imagination -- daring and lurid and impossible. Yes, a cartoon of the mind.”

“For them not to have fucked then and there would have required such a reversal of the laws of nature as to cause Newton to spin in his coffin and NASA to discontinue the space program.”

“My grandmother got approved right before the law changed, so naturally she got grandfathered in. In related news, but completely unrelated, I was adopted.”