R. Scott Bakker, The Darkness That Comes Before

"History. Language. Passion. Custom. All these things determine what men say, think, and do. These are the hidden puppet-strings from which all men hang."

"The world has long ceased to be the author of your anguish."

"Hoga Gothyelk no longer felt anger, not truly -- only varieties of sorrow."

"Saying 'I could have done more,' Zin, is what marks a man as a man and not a God."

"There’s faith that knows itself as faith, Proyas, and there’s faith that confuses itself for knowledge. The first embraces uncertainty, acknowledges the mysteriousness of the God. It begets compassion and tolerance. Who can entirely condemn when they’re not entirely certain they’re in the right? But the second, Proyas, the second embraces certainty and only pays lip service to the God’s mystery. It begets intolerance, hatred, violence."

"Though all men be equally frail before the world, the differences between them are terrifying."

"The thoughts of all men arise from the darkness. If you are the movement of your soul, and the cause of that movement precedes you, then how could you ever call your thoughts your own? How could you be anything other than a slave to the darkness that comes before?"