John Wyndham

Poor baby, what a world to come into.

"Knowledge?" said the doctor. "Yes, I suppose that is it. For ever and for ever seeking knowledge. And we don't even know why we seek it. It's an instinct, like self-preservation; and about as comprehensible. Why, I wonder, do I keep on living. I know I've got to die sooner or later, yet I take the best care I can that it shall be later instead of finishing the thing off in a reasonable manner. After all, I've done my bit—propagated my species, and yet for some inscrutable reason I want to go on living and learning. Just an instinct. Some kink in the evolutionary process caused this passion for knowledge, and the result is man—an odd little creature, scuttling around and piling up mountains of this curious commodity.

What do you suppose will happen when one day a man sits back in his chair and says: 'Knowledge is complete'? You see, it just sounds silly. We're so used to collecting it, that we can't imagine a world where it is all collected and finished."

"No one but a fool would say that a man who seethes inside like a volcano is calm.

I only know that when I see a man so tormented and cheated, and with such a look in his eyes, he is dangerous."

"What did I tell you?" said my neighbour excitedly. "Force of mind, that's what those people use; that's why their hands are vestigial. Pure will-power."

The dwarf seemed to hear him, for he looked towards us.

"I am surprised," he sneered, "that you even know of such a thing as will-power. I judged by your reflexes that you had only instincts."

Those are the methods of Earth; that is the honour of great companies, as you will know to your cost should you have dealings with them. They'll use you, and then break you. . . .

"But it is the old story of new generations refusing to be bound by the promises of their forefathers."

"Truth is not altered by belief or disbelief."

"There are some forms of knowledge which it is unwise to spread; men are not yet ready to handle them."

"The English," [Vinski] remarked at length, "have a saying that possession is nine points of the law. It is just the kind of sentiment one would expect to find in a capitalist country."

Many men on earth have the vanity to believe in another life.

"We have been but little molested, for we have not the things which most men value."

"It was curious that, in facing the man, I felt none of the distaste one has for an abnormality."