Quotes from Ken Follett

With faultless good manners they would lead the world to destruction.

One of the monks was doing something incomprehensible at the altar, and the others would occasionally chant a few phrases of mumbo jumbo.

Philip looked incredulously at the tiny bundle in Johnny's arms. He reached out a hand tentatively, and lifted a corner of the blanket. He saw a wrinkled pink face, an open toothless mouth and a little bald head—a miniature of an aging monk.

Barrow, who evidently had never seen an atlas, felt superior to Descartes, Rembrandt, and Beethoven.

The extra line or two around her eyes only made them more fascinating; the touch of silver in her hair enhanced the blackness of the rest; and if she was a little heavier than she had been it made her body more voluptuous.

My father used to say: never call a meeting until the outcome is a foregone conclusion.

Being a monk was the strangest and most perverted way of life imaginable. Monks spent half their lives putting themselves through pain and discomfort that they could easily avoid, and the other half muttering meaningless mumbo jumbo in empty churches at all hours of the day and night. They deliberately shunned anything good—girls, sports, feasting and family life.

but instead of feeling ashamed she was overwhelmed by a sense of her own power. She had resolved not to let people make her a victim, and she had proved she could keep her resolution.

There will always be crashes. They are necessary to remind good and bad investors that risk is real.

The greater their ignorance, the stronger their opinions. Georgetown

I will marry a man who is clever and thoughtful and who wants his wife to be more than just the most senior of his servants.

But when you grab happiness you may let go of something more valuable --- your integrity. - Hugh Pilaster

He had quoted Lenin: 'He who controls Berlin, controls Germany; and who controls Germany, controls Europe.

And so, Aldred thought, great ones sin with impunity while lesser men are brutally chastised.

Juré a mi padre, cuando se estaba muriendo, que cuidaría de Richard hasta que llegara a ser conde de Shiring - explicó. ¡Pero puede ser que eso no ocurra nunca! Un juramento es un juramento. Es imposible que creas tal cosa -dijo él-. ¡Un juramento sólo son palabras! No es nada en comparación con esto. Esto es real, esto somos tú y yo.

the Germans have got to be stopped. They think they're entitled to rule the world!" Da said: "We're British. Our empire holds sway over more than four hundred million people. Hardly any of them are entitled to vote. They have no control over their own countries. Ask the average British man why, and he'll say it's our destiny to govern inferior peoples.

No storm can shake my inmost calm While to that rock I'm clinging Since Love is Lord of heaven and earth How can I keep from singing?

El presidente Wilson dice que un líder debe tratar a la opinión pública del mismo modo en que un marinero se aprovecha del viento, utilizándolo para impulsar la nave en una dirección u otra, pero nunca intentando ir directamente contra él.

I must remember that, Philip thought: when you're about to be turned down, go for a postponement. p314

They wanted to look as if they had the right to close meetings and empty buildings, to burst into homes and offices and arrest people, to drag them to jails and camps and beat them up, interrogate and torture them, as

No habían perdido ni un minuto de su valioso tiempo en dormir.

he thinks the aldermen's job is to make decisions and then enforce them. When your father was mayor he said that aldermen should rule the town by serving it." Ned said impatiently: "That sounds like two ways of looking at the same thing." "It's not, though," said his mother. "It's two different worlds.

Estas elecciones son demasiado importantes para que se decidan con un puñado de burlas.

They demanded tolerance, and the right to worship as they wished, but they were never satisfied with that, he thought with exasperation. They believed their rivals were not just mistaken but evil. Catholic practices—the ways in which Europeans had worshipped for hundreds of years—were blasphemous, they said, and must be abolished. They did not practice the tolerance they preached.