Getting an education was a bit like a communicable sexual disease. It made you unsuitable for a lot of jobs and then you had the urge to pass it on.

***

This is very similar to the suggestion put forward by the Quirmian philosopher Ventre, who said, "Possibly the gods exist, and possibly they do not. So why not believe in them in any case? If it's all true you'll go to a lovely place when you die, and if it isn't then you've lost nothing, right?" When he died he woke up in a circle of gods holding nasty-looking sticks and one of them said, "We're going to show you what we think of Mr Clever Dick in these parts..."

***

Biers was where the undead drank. And when Igor the barman was asked for a Bloody Mary, he didn't mix a metaphor.

***

In Biers, unless you weren't choosy, it paid to order a drink that was transparent, because Igor also had undirected ideas about what you could stick on the end of a cocktail stick. If you saw something spherical and green, you just had to hope it was an olive.

***

"Did you check the list?" YES. TWICE. ARE YOU SURE THAT'S ENOUGH? "Definitely." COULDN'T REALLY MAKE HEAD OR TAIL OF IT, TO TELL YOU THE TRUTH. HOW CAN I TELL IF HE'S BEEN NAUGHTY OR NICE, FOR EXAMPLE?

***

Everything starts somewhere, though many physicists disagree. But people have always been dimly aware of the problem with the start of things. They wonder how the snowplough driver gets to work, or how the makers of dictionaries look up the spelling of words.

***

We took pity on him because he'd lost both parents at an early age. I think that, on reflection, we should have wondered a bit more about that.

***

The truth may be out there, but lies are inside your head.

***

The universe clearly operates for the benefit of humanity. This can be readily seen from the convenient way that the sun comes up in the morning, when people are ready to start the day.

***

Ignorant : A state of not knowing what a pronoun is, or how to find the square root of 27.4, and merely knowing childish and useless things like which of the 70 almost identical looking species of the purple sea snake are the deadly ones, how to navigate across a 1000 miles of featureless ocean by means of a piece of string and a small clay model of your grandfather, and other such trivial matters. Credulous : Having views about the world, the universe, and humanity's place in it that are shared only by very unsophisticated people and the most intelligent and advanced mathematicians and physicists.

***

It was not technically audible, but nevertheless Susan could hear the wizard's mind back-pedalling. Up ahead was the conclusion that Teatime had no time for people he didnt need.

***

"I dont actually think," Ponder Stibbons said gloomily, "that I want to tell the Archchancellor that this machine stops working if we take its fluffy teddy bear away. I just dont think I want to live in that kind of world." "Er, you could always, you know, sort of say it needs to work with the FTB enabled."

***

AND WHAT DO YOU WANT FOR HOGWATCH, SMALL HUMAN? - Death

***

The philosopher Didactylos has summed up an alternative hypothesis as "Things just happen. What the hell."

***

The members of the Guild of Assassins considered themselves cultured men who enjoyed good music and food and literature. And they knew the value of human life. To a penny, in many cases.

***

...the [Assassins'] Guild took young boys and gave them a splendid education and incidentally taught them how to kill, cleanly and dispassionately, for money and for the good of society, or at least that part of society that had money, and what other kind of society was there?

***

Mister Teatime had a truly brilliant mind, but it was brilliant like a fractured mirror, all marvelous facets and rainbows but, ultimately, also something that was broken.

***

"This one's mental." "Eccentric." "What's the difference?" "A bag of cash."

***

"This is Hogswatch! It's supposed to be jolly, with mistletoe and holly, and -- and other things ending in olly!"

***

And Susan was bright enough to know that the phrase "Someone ought to do something" was not, by itself, a helpful one. People who used it never added the rider "and that someone is me."

***

The snow had done what even wizards and the Watch couldn't do, which was clean up Ankh-Morpork.

***

But the animated display of Dolls of All Nations was definitely in trouble. The musical box underneath was still playing "Wouldn't It Be Nice If Everyone Was Nice" but the rods that animated the figures had got twisted out of shape, so that the Klatchian boy was rhythmically hitting the Omnian girl over the head with his ceremonial spear, while the girl in Agatean national costume was kicking a small Llamedosian druid repeated in the ear. A chorus of small children was cheering them on indiscriminately.

***

Ponder:"Of course, Hex doesn't actually think. Not as such. It just appears to be thinking." Ridcully:"Ah. Like the Dean. Any chance of fitting a brain like this into the Dean's head?" Ponder:"It does weigh ten tons, Archchancellor." Ridcully:"Ah. Really? Oh. Quite a large crowbar would be in order, then."

***

"Don't worry, [Teatime] doesn't suspect you of anything." "How d'you know?" "You're still alive, yeah?"

***

"Who are you?" "I ... think my name is Bilious. I'm the ... I'm the oh god of Hangovers." "There's a God of Hangovers?" "An oh god," he corrected. "When people witness me, you see, they clutch their head and say 'Oh God...'"

***

Wizards tended to roll well, or in any case are well padded enough to bounce.

***

Dean:"I suppose we can all do that, can we? Anyone care to think up some new pixie?" Runes: "Like the Hair Loss Fairy?" Dean:"I am not losing my hair! It is just very finely spaced." Runes: "Half on your head and half on your hairbrush." Ridcully:"No sense in bein' bashful about goin' bald. Anyway, you know what they say about bald men, Dean." Runes: "Yes, they say, 'Look at him, he's got no hair.'"

***

Hex had raised the subject [of electricity] one night ... they'd tried rubbing balloons and glass rods until they'd been able to stick Adrian onto the ceiling, and it hadn't had any effect on Hex. Then they'd tried tying a lot of cats to a wheel which, when revolved against some beads of amber, caused any amount of electricity all over the plce. The wretched stuff hung around for days, but there didn't seem any way of ladling it into Hex and anyone no one could stand the noise.

***

Dean:"It's not like 'flu, Ridcully. Wisdom is ... well, instilled." Ridcully:"We bring students here and hope they catch wisdom off us, don't we?" Dean:"Well, metaphorically." Ridcully:"And if you hang around with a bunch of idiots you're bound to become pretty daft yourself." Dean:"I suppose in a manner of speaking..." Ridcully:"And you've only got to talk to the poor old Bursar for five minutes and you think you're going a bit potty yourself, am I right? So Hex here has caught daftness off the Bursar. Simple. Real stupidity beats artificial intelligence every time."

***

+++ Divide By Cucumber Error. Please Reinstall Universe And Reboot +++

***

Like many barmen, Igor kept a club under the bar to deal with those little upsets that occurred around closing time ... Igor's weapon of choice was a little different. It was tipped with silver (for werewolves), hung with garlic (for vampires) and wrapped around with a strip of blanket (for bogeymen). For everyone else the fact that it was two feet of solid bog-oak usually sufficed.

***

On the simple table by the bed was a small, rather crude portrait of a bulldog in a wig, although on closer inspection it might have been a woman.

***

In the past, when Hex had been recalcitrant about its calculations ... Ponder had tried to sort things out calmly and logically. It had never, ever occurred to him to contemplate hitting Hex with a mallet. But this was, in fact, what Ridcully was threatening to do. What was impressive, and also more than a little worrying, was that Hex seemed to understand the concept.

***

"I've worked out," said the Senior Wrangler, "that over the years I have been a net exporter of Hogswatch presents--" "Oh, everyone is," said the Chair. "You spend a fortune on other people and what you get when all the paper is cleared away is one slipper that's the wrong colour and a book about earwax."

***

Part of Bilious thought: I'm attracted to a girl who actually has to shut down all other brain functions in order to think about the order of the letters of the alphabet. On the other hand, she's attracted to someone who's wearing a toga that looks as though a family of weasels have had a party in it, so maybe I'll stop this thought right here.

***

"If we're not cheerful she bursts into tears," said the Chair of Indefinite Studies. "The Senior Wranger's doing some juggling for her at the moment." "But he can't juggle!" "I think that's cheering her up a bit."

***

"I really should talk to him, sir. He's had a near-death experience!" "We all have. It's called 'living.'"

***

IT GETS UNDER YOUR SKIN, LIFE, said Death, stepping forward. SPEAKING METAPHORICALLY, OF COURSE. IT'S A HABIT THAT'S HARD TO GIVE UP. ONE PUFF OF BREATH IS NEVER ENOUGH. YOU'LL FIND YOU WANT TO TAKE ANOTHER.

***

Bloody Stupid Johnson's approach to music was similar to his approach in every field that was caressed by his genius in the same way that a potato field is touched by a late frost. Make it loud, he said. Make it wide. Make it all-embracing. And thus the Great Organ of Unseen University was the only one in the world where you could play an entire symphony scored for thunderstorm and squashed toad noises.

***