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Terry Pratchett Quotes - Page 15

All Quotes Accidents Adventure Age Arguing Art Atheism Atheist Authority Balance Beer Belief Blame Chaos Character Children Chocolate Choices Coffee Copper Country Crime Darkness Death Dementia Democracy Doubt Dying Effort End Of The World Evil Fate Feelings Fighting Finding Yourself Flying Food Football Fun Funeral Funny Genius Geography Giving Gold Goodbye Growing Up Hate Heart Heaven Hell History Home Horror House Humanity Hurt Husband Ignorance Imagination Inspiration Inspirational Jesus Journey Justice Killing Language Leaving Letting Go Life Life And Death Listening Literature Logic Losing Luck Lying Magic Mankind Manners Memories Military Moon Morning Motivational Mountain Observation Opportunity Pain Past Perspective Philosophy Police Pride Progress Purpose Quality Rain Reading Reality Religion Responsibility Romance Running Safety Sanity School Science Science Fiction Silence Sin Singing Sleep Smoking Son Soul Spring Students Stupidity Style Suffering Sunrise Travel Trust Truth Understanding Universe Violence Waiting Wall War Water Wife Winning Work Out Worry Writing
No it's not! said Constable Visit. Atheism is a denial of a god. Therefore It Is A Religious Position, said Dorfl. Indeed, A True Atheist Thinks Of The Gods Constantly, Albeit In Terms of Denial. Therefore, Atheism Is A

No it's not!" said Constable Visit. "Atheism is a denial of a god." "Therefore It Is A Religious Position," said Dorfl. "Indeed, A True Atheist Thinks Of The Gods Constantly, Albeit In Terms of Denial. Therefore, Atheism Is A Form Of Belief. If The Atheist Truly Did Not Believe, He Or She Would Not Bother To Deny.

Terry Pratchett
Religious, Atheist, Believe
Terry Pratchett (1996). “Feet of Clay: A Novel of Discworld”, Harper Prism

A push-and-go wooden duck on wheels can cause quite a lot of damage if wielded with enough force.

Terry Pratchett
Ducks, Damage, Causes

It's going to look pretty good, then, isn't it," said War testily, "the One Horseman and Three Pedestrians of the Apocalypse.

Terry Pratchett
War, Three, Looks

Aziraphale. The Enemy, of course. But an enemy for six thousand years now, which made him a sort of friend.

Terry Pratchett
Years, Enemy, Six
Neil Gaiman, Terry Pratchett (2011). “Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch”, p.39, Harper Collins

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

Terry Pratchett
Enemy, Weapons, Use

Go anywhere you wish, talk to everyone. Ask any questions; you will be given answers. When you want to learn, you will be taught. Use the library. Open any book.

Terry Pratchett
Book, Wish, Library

Vampires have risen from the dead, the grave, and the crypt, but have never managed it from the cat.

Terry Pratchett
Cat, Vampire, Graves
Terry Pratchett, Jacqueline Simpson (2008). “The Folklore of Discworld”, Doubleday UK

Coffee is a way of stealing time that should by rights belong to your older self.

Terry Pratchett
Coffee, Self, Rights
"Happy International Coffee day - 10 great coffee quotes from literature" by Marta Bausells, www.theguardian.com. September 29, 2015.

The librarians were mysterious. It was said they could tell what book you needed just by looking at you, and they could take your voice away with a word.

Terry Pratchett
Book, Voice, Mysterious
FaceBook post by Terry Pratchett from Aug 30, 2015

Putting up a statue to someone who tried to stop a war is not very, um, statuesque. Of course, if you had butchered five hundred of your own men out of arrogant carelessness, we'd be melting the bronze already.

Terry Pratchett
War, Men, Melting
Terry Pratchett (2013). “Jingo: Stage Adaptation”, p.108, A&C Black

Technically, the city of Ankh-Morpork is a Tyranny, which is not always the same thing as a monarchy, and in fact even the post of Tyrant has been somewhat redefined by the incumbent, Lord Vetinari, as the only form of democracy that works. Everyone is entitled to vote, unless disqualified by reason of age or not being Lord Vetinari.

Terry Pratchett
Cities, Tyrants, Democracy
Stephen Briggs, Terry Pratchett (2015). “Unseen Academicals”, p.13, Oberon Books

There are times when phrases such as 'totally astonished' just don't do the job. I am of course delighted and honoured and, needless to say, flabbergasted.

Terry Pratchett
Jobs, Phrases, Courses
"A dubbing for creating a flat world on top of a turtle" by Sam Jones, www.theguardian.com. December 30, 2008.

Sam Vimes could parallel process. Most husbands can. They learn to follow their own line of thought while at the same time listening to what their wives say. And the listening is important, because at any time they could be challenged and must be ready to quote the last sentence in full. A vital additional skill is being able to scan the dialogue for telltale phrases such as "and they can deliver it tomorrow" or "so I've invited them for dinner?" or "they can do it in blue, really quite cheaply.

Terry Pratchett
Husband, Blue, Skills
"The Fifth Elephant". Book by ‎Terry Pratchett, 1999.

Whatever happens, they say afterwards, it must have been fate. People are always a little confused about this, as they are in the case of miracles. When someone is saved from certain death by a strange concatenation of circumstances, they say that's a miracle. But of course if someone is killed by a freak chain of events -- the oil spilled just there, the safety fence broken just there -- that must also be a miracle. Just because it's not nice doesn't mean it's not miraculous.

Terry Pratchett
Confused, Nice, Mean
"Interesting Times". Book by Terry Pratchett, 1994.

People whose concept of ancient history is the first series of Star Trek may be treated with patience, because it's usually not their fault they were reduced to getting their education from school.

Terry Pratchett
Stars, School, People

That's why it's always worth having a few philosophers around the place. One minute it's all is truth beauty and is beauty truth, and does a falling tree in the forest make a sound if there's no one there to hear it, and then just when you think they're going to start dribbling one of 'em says, incidentally, putting a thirty-foot parabolic reflector on a high place to shoot the rays of the sun at an enemy's ships would be a very interesting demonstration of optical principles.

Terry Pratchett
Fall, Thinking, Feet
"Small Gods". Book by ‎Terry Pratchett, 1992.

Dwarfs were not a naturally religious species, but in a world where pit props could crack without warning and pockets of fire damp could suddenly explode they'd seen the need for gods as the sort of supernatural equivalent of a hard hat. Besides, when you hit your thumb with an eight-pound hammer it's nice to be able to blaspheme. It takes a very special and strong-minded kind of atheist to jump up and down with their hand clasped under their other armpit and shout, "Oh, random-fluctuations-in-the-space-time-continuum!" or "Aaargh, primitive-and-outmoded-concept on a crutch!

Terry Pratchett
Religious, Atheist, Strong

He sighed. It had come to this. He was a responsible authority, and people could use terms like "core values" at him with impunity.

Terry Pratchett
People, Use, Authority

First Thoughts are the everyday thoughts. Everyone has those. Second Thoughts are the thoughts you think about the way you think. People who enjoy thinking have those. Third Thoughts are thoughts that watch the world and think all by themselves. They’re rare, and often troublesome. Listening to them is part of witchcraft.

Terry Pratchett
Thinking, People, Everyday

Rincewind shivered. He was not, of course, an atheist; on the Disc the gods dealt severely with atheists. On the few occasions when he had some spare change he had always made a point of dropping a few coppers into a temple coffer, somewhere, on the principle that a man needed all the friends he could get. But usually he didn't bother the Gods, and he hoped the Gods wouldn't bother him. Life was quite complicated enough.

Terry Pratchett
Life, God, Atheist

I didn't go to university. Didn't even finish A-levels. But I have sympathy for those who did.

Terry Pratchett
Sympathy, Levels, University
"Terry Pratchett". www.theguardian.com. July 22, 2008.

I don't want unnecessary violence, sergeant," said Blouse. "Right you are, sir!" said the sergeant. "Carborundum! First man comes through that door runnin', I want him nailed to the wall!" He caught the lieutenant's eye, and added: "But not too hard!

Terry Pratchett
Wall, Eye, Men
Terry Pratchett (2008). “Monstrous Regiment: (Discworld Novel 31)”, p.136, Random House

Monsters are getting more uppity, too (...) I heard where this guy, he killed this monster in this lake, no problem, stuck its arm up over the door (...) and you know what? Its mum come and complained. Its actual mum come right down to the hall next day and complained. Actually complained. That's the respect you get.

Terry Pratchett
Lakes, Doors, Next Day

I [...] vowed that rather than let Alzheimer's take me, I would take it. I would live my life as ever to the full and die, ­before the disease mounted its last ­attack, in my own home, in a chair on the lawn, with a brandy in my hand to wash down whatever modern ­version of the "Brompton cocktail" some ­helpful medic could supply. And with ­Thomas Tallis on my iPod, I would shake hands with Death.

Terry Pratchett
Life, Home, Ipods
"Terry Pratchett: my case for a euthanasia tribunal". www.theguardian.com. February 1, 2010.

It's hard to explain," said Brutha. "But I think it's got something to do with how people should behave... you should do things because they're right. Not because gods say so. They might say something different another time.

Terry Pratchett
Thinking, People, Different

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