Quotes from David Gemmell

What is the point, then, of dying when the cause is already lost? What is the point of living without a cause worth dying for?

I am a stranger. You do not need to lie to me or pretend. Only with friends do you need masks

I am a stranger. You do not need to lie to me or pretend. Only with friends do you need masks - Surely it is only with friends that one can be at peace. - It is easier with strangers, for they touch your life but for an instant. You will not disappoint them, for you owe them nothing; neither do they expect anything. Friends you can hurt, for they expect everything.

Is it not obvious? What is life but a betrayal? We start out young, full of hope. The sun is good, the world awaits us. But every passing year shows how small you are, how insignificant against the power of the seasons. Then you age. Your strength fails and the world laughs at you through the jeers of younger men. And you die. Alone. Unfulfilled. But sometimes . . . sometimes there will come a man who is not insignificant. He can change the world, rob the seasons of their power. He is the sun.

Less of a Galahad than a Lancelot, thought Archer. A flawed knight in a flawed world, unstable yet unyielding.

In all his life he had never known such intensity of passion, such completeness of being. Nothing existed in all the world, save this woman beneath him. He had no sense of place or time, nor even identity. There was no war, no mission, no life beyond. There was no guilt, only a joy he had experienced only once before, in a delirium dream on the point of death.

Most men just react to circumstances, but thinkers create the circumstances. If

You are of the blood, Arvan. It will carry you through, he said Words! Just words. Blood was merely dark liquid — it carried no secrets, no mysteries. Courage was a thing of the soul and not a gift that a man could bestow on his sons

I feel that way about heaven; it's far more important that Heaven should exist than that I should ever see it.

Do you happen to know when the apothecary will be arriving? We have an injured brother and are in need of herbs to reduce his fever. You're the one who'll need the apothecary! I have already said that I need the apothecary. Shall I speak more slowly?

Aye, you ancients always say things were better in the old days, replied the man. I don't think it's true, though. I reckon young warriors look at you and are reminded of their grandfathers. Then they can't possibly fight you. Maybe so, agreed the axman. At my age I'll take any advantage I can get.

You did not kill those children, and you could not have saved them. There is a limit to the power of any single man, even a hero. You were the boy who fought the bear. Now you are the man who killed the king. Yet you are only a man. You are not responsible for the woes of the world or the evil of other men.

You understand? If the past must haunt you, then use it wisely. You cannot alter the past, but you can use it to alter the future. The terror you saw has strengthened you, Connavar. It has given you purpose. Bless the dead for that. And move on.

grinned. 'Xenophon taught me that victory is achieved by putting the thought of defeat into the heart of your enemy. To him goes the honour.

The tree bark began to move, forming a face of wood.

Artemis does not accept the blood of women. Artemis will accept my blood.

Love is a mystery. We embrace it where we can. Mostly we do not choose whom we love. It just happens. A voice speaks to us, in ways the ear cannot hear. We recognize a beauty that the eye does not see. We experience a change in our hearts that no voice can describe. There is no evil in love, Kalliope.

I do not believe that the way to fight great evil is to commit a lesser one.

In any broth, the scum [politicians] always rises to the top.

I have found in my life, Rek, that there are a few actions which are unforgivable. And certainly there are no words said that carry such a penalty. It is a man's lot, I fear, to strike out when he has suffered hurt.

Boy, said Druss, his eyes cold, think well about this venture. For make no mistake, you cannot stand before me and live. No man ever has. The words were spoken softly, yet no one disbelieved the old man.

A sense of calm settled over Tenaka. An inner peace seemed to pulse from the very earth at his feet, from the distant blue mountain, to whisper in the long grass of the Steppes. He closed his eyes and opened his ears to the music of silence.

Each man has a breaking point, no matter how strong his spirit. Somewhere, deep inside him, there is a flaw that only the fickle cruelty of fate can find. A man's strength is ultimately born of his knowledge of his own weakness

People believe what they want to believe. The truth rarely makes a difference.