“He who is taught to live upon little owes more to his father’s wisdom than he who has a great deal left to him owes to his father’s care.”

“He was a self-made man who owed his lack of success to nobody.”

“Misery, in cold truth, is a weight less upon those who undergo it than upon the minds of those who see it; for he who is cold and starving is so busy in his efforts to obtain warmth and food that he has little time for self-pity, and endures his unhappy condition better than those who take it upon themselves to suffer for him.”

“So Aquila took his father’s service upon him. It wasn’t as good as love; it wasn’t as good as hate; but it was something to put into the emptiness within him; better than nothing at all.”

“Alexander emerges as an almost Hamlet-like figure, more sinned against than sinning. In a sense Alexander, too, was haunted and motivated by his father’s ghost... He may well have saved more lives than he destroyed and was rarely gratuitous in the use of violence... his legacy is enormous. He was the founder of the Hellenistic Age, which in turn has bequeathed us the foundations of our modern art, science and culture.”

“He could feel his father’s history like ruts worn deep in the road.”