# Quote — James S. A. Corey, Persepolis Rising

> The hardest thing was to trust his own people to do their jobs well, but it was what he had to do. He wondered if the high consul suffered the same thing—knowing that all the critical action would be taken by others who were guided by his orders, but in conditions he could only guess at, and in places where his intervention, even if it were possible, could only muddy the waters. It was a subtle and terrible insight. The powerlessness of control.

- Author: [James S. A. Corey](https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-s-a-corey.md)
- Book: [Persepolis Rising](https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-s-a-corey/persepolis-rising.md)
- Page: 476
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/James_S._A._Corey#Persepolis_Rising_(2017)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-s-a-corey/persepolis-rising/the-hardest-thing

## More from this book

> “You’re not picking a fight with the things that made the protomolecule. You’re picking a fight with whatever killed them. Orders of magnitude above the things that were orders of magnitude above us. You’ve got to know this is going to escalate if we keep using these technologies.”
>
> “We were always going to keep using these technologies. That was inevitable the moment we opened the gates,” Duarte said. “If you’ve studied any history at all, you know that. Never in human history have we discovered something useful and then chosen not to use it.”

p. 548 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-s-a-corey/persepolis-rising/youre-not-picking.md)

> The fight for survival made everything either resilient or forgotten.

p. 532 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-s-a-corey/persepolis-rising/the-fight-for.md)

> He lifted the gun.
>
> “Wait!” Singh said. “Wait. Do you believe all that? About what killing me is supposed to achieve?”
>
> “I am an officer of the Laconian Empire, Governor Singh. I believe what I’m told to believe.”

p. 520 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-s-a-corey/persepolis-rising/he-lifted-the.md)