The universe forgives those who give until their hearts are aching and their spirits weak, and finds a way to renew all strength and cure all ills, in this world or the next, if a soul can just have faith.
This was what men fought for, what men died for: a chance at life, and to fight on other days - the battle of your choice, of the body, or the heart, or the soul.
Sometimes the cost of winning for all the right reasons is so great that spirits die and hearts grow cold.
You count up your dead, every one. Always. Recall them, each and all - every face, every heart.
The gods want to bring a better day, and you are their messengers. Trust not in all you see. Trust only in your hearts. And in us, who love you both.
Some nights, one wants to tell beloveds everything that's been waiting to be said. Some nights, a man needs flesh and blood and warm breath and a loving heart.
Very little in science fiction can transcend the gimmickry of a technical conceit, yet without that conceit at its heart a book is not truly science fiction. Furthermore, so little emerging thought and technology is employed by sf writers today that the genre is lagging far behind reality both in the cosmology area and the technology area: sf is no longer a place to experiment, but is now very derivative.
Humiliation sets armies marching, empires falling, breaks hearts and minds and souls.
