“You know how to pray, don’t you? Just put your hands together and hope.”

“The past needs to be remembered. If you do not know where you come from, then you don’t know where you are, and if you don’t know where you are, then you don’t know where you’re going.”

“How can you protect yourself by carrying a sword if you don’t know how to use it?’Not me, sir. Other people. They see the sword and don’t attack me,’ said Maladict patiently.Yes, but if they did, lad, you wouldn’t be any good with it,’ said the sergeant.No, sir. I’d probably settle for just ripping their heads off, sir. That’s what I mean by protection, sir. Theirs, not mine. And I’d get hell from the League if I did that, sir.”

“It doesn't stop being magic just because you know how it works.”

“Something Vimes had learned as a young guard drifted up from memory. If you have to look along the shaft of an arrow from the wrong end, if a man has you entirely at his mercy, then hope like hell that man is an evil man. Because the evil like power, power over people, and they want to see you in fear. They want you to know you're going to die. So they'll talk. They'll gloat.They'll watch you squirm. They'll put off the moment of murder like another man will put off a good cigar.So hope like hell your captor is an evil man. A good man will kill you with hardly a word.”

“A weapon you held and didn't know how to use belonged to your enemy.”

“They were also slightly less intelligent than he was. This is a quality you should always pray for in your would-be murderer.”