52 quotes
Afterward loses too many battles to Too Late.
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
Revenge is empty. It cannot bring back the dead.
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
Eventually the tale came to an end, suddenly and seemingly in the middle, like a piece of foreign music.
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
Pulg, alongside his pink streak of sentimentality, had recently taken to sporting a gray one of superstition.
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
Thieves and astrologers moved restlessly in their sleep, sensing that the hours of night and work were drawing near.
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
It was the laughter of the Elder Gods observing their creature man and noting their omissions, miscalculations and mistakes.
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
Women are horrible. I mean, quite as horrible as men. Oh, is there anyone in the wide world that has aught but ice water in his or her veins?
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
The Devourers want to brood about their great service to the many universes—it is their claim that servile customers make the most obedient subjects for the gods.
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
Knowledge takes precedence over death.
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
I know, I know, the folk here are narrow-visioned, custom-bound. But matched with the twisted minds of civilization, they’re straight as pines.
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
Lord, what romantical fools men were, to overpass the known and good in order to strain and stretch after the mysterious merely unknown. Were dreams simply better than reality? Had fancy always more style?
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
For what is life but greed in action?
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
Barbarism can match civilization’s every stench. Not one move in our frostbit lives but is strictured by a mad god’s laws, which we call customs, and by black-handed irrationalities from which there is no escape.
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
Girls had a way of blotting out all lesser, but not thereby despicable, delights. Girls were for dessert.
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
It was more a patriotic than religious matter with Fafhrd. He believed in Odin only during moments of sentimental weakness.
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
With a happy roaring shout only he could hear, blood rushed through the Mouser’s arteries toward his center, reviving his limp manhood in a mere moment, as a magically summoned genie offhandedly builds a tower.
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
Now it may be that in the world of Newhon there are gods of whom even Death does not know and who from time to time take pleasure in putting obstacles in his path. Or it may be that Chance is quite as great a power as Necessity.
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
“Oaths are made to be kept only until their purpose be fulfilled,” the fluty voice responded. “Every geas is lifted at last, every self-set rule repealed. Otherwise orderliness in life becomes a limitation to growth; discipline, chains; integrity, bondage and evil-doing.”
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
Fafhrd retorted, a little hotly, “Killing in fight isn’t murder.”
Again the Mouser shrugged. “Killing is murder, no matter what nice names you give. Just as eating is devouring, and drinking guzzling.”
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)
But oh, this lifelong servitude to girls—whimsical, innocent, calculating, icicle-eyed and hearted, fleeting, tripping little demons! White, slim-necked, sharp-toothed, restlessly bobbing weasels with the soulful eyes of lemurs!
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series (1939)