Quotes About Authority

Things like crowns had a troublesome effect on clever folk; it was best to leave all the reigning to the kind of people whose eyebrows met in the middle when they tried to think. In a funny sort of way, they were much better at it.

Everybody present laughed nervously, except Lord Vetinari, who just laughed.

Everyone was guilty of something. Vimes knew that. Every copper knew it. That was how you maintained your authority—everyone, talking to a copper, was secretly afraid you could see their guilty secret written on their forehead. You couldn't, of course. But neither were you supposed to drag someone off the street and smash their fingers with a hammer until they told you what it was.

No more kings. Vimes had difficulty in articulating why this should be so, why the concept resonated in his very bones. After all, a good many of the patricians had been as bad as any king. But they were...sort of...bad on equal terms. What set Vimes's teeth on edge was the idea that kings were a different kind of human being. A higher lifeform. Somehow magical.

The Captain of the Watch says if you're still in the City by sunrise he will personally have you buried alive.

The horsemen came closer. Vimes was not good at horsemen. Something in him resented being addressed by anyone eight feet above the ground. He didn't like the sensation of being looked at by nostrils.

Gentlemen, please," said the Patrician. He shook his head. "Let's have no fighting, please. This is, after all, a council of war.

Some people are born to command. Some people achieve command. And others have command thrust upon them ...

but William felt in his bones that you couldn't run a city on the basis of what the Watch liked. The Watch would probably like it if everyone spent their time indoors, with their hands on the table where people could see them.

But all this business about kings and lords, it's against basic human dignity. We're all born equal. It makes me sick.' 'Never heard you talk like this before, Frederick,' said Nobby. 'It's Sergeant Colon to you, Nobby.

The important thing about being a leader is not being right or wrong but being certain. Of course it helps to be right as well, the Abbot conceeded.

Vetinari gave him a look that did not actually employ a raised eyebrow but which implied that one might be forthcoming if the recipient of the look pushed his luck.

Around the Godde there forms a Shelle of prayers and Ceremonies and Buildings and Priestes and Authority, until at Last the Godde Dies. Ande this maye notte be noticed.

We've always been privileged, you see. Privilege just means 'private law.' That's exactly what it means.

The worst part, the worst part, was that Lord de Worde was never wrong. It was not a position he understood in relation to his personal geography. People who took an opposing view were insane, or dangerous, or possibly even not really people. You couldn't have an argument with Lord de Worde. Not a proper argument. An argument, from arguer , meant to debate and discuss and persuade by reason. What you could have with William's father was a flaming row.

To be a leader you have to learn to shout! But after you've learned to shout, you have to learn not to!

A foot on the neck is nine points of the law.

Governments govern, but prime ministers and presidents do not personally turn up in people's homes to tell them how to run their lives, because of the mortal danger this would present. There are laws instead.

being assassinated is natural causes for a king.

The problem is, people only think for themselves if you tell them to.

Royalty pollutes people's minds, boy. honest men start bowing and bobbing just because someone's granddad was a bigger murdering bastard than theirs was.

And it be well for a knowlessman that he should not be here, for he would be taken from this place and his gaskin slit, his moules shown to the four winds, his welchet torn asunder with many hooks and his figgin placed upon a spike (...)

Though here's a tip, though. Just 'ho, ho, ho' will do. Don't say, 'Cower, brief mortals' unless you want them to grow up to be moneylenders or some such.

a hint was to Esk what a mosquito bite was to the average rhino because she was already learning that if you ignore the rules people will, half the time, quietly rewrite them so that they don't apply to you.