Lloyd Alexander

If I fret over tomorrow, I'll have little joy today.

“Count yourself lucky,” the potter went on, “that you have understood this now and not spent your years in vain hope. This much have you learned, and no learning is wasted.”

If I do find pride, I'll not find it in what I was or what I am, but what I may become. Not in my birth, but in myself.

“I saw myself,” Taran answered. “In the time I watched, I saw strength – and frailty. Pride and vanity, courage and fear. Of wisdom, a little. Of folly, much. Of intentions, many good ones; but many more left undone. In this, alas, I saw myself a man like any other.

“But this, too, I saw,” he went on. “Alike as men may seem, each is different as flakes of snow, no two the same. You told me you had no need to seek the Mirror, knowing you were Annlaw Clay-Shaper. Now I know who I am: myself and none other. I am Taran.”

“There is much to be known,” said Adaon, “and above all much to be loved, be it the turn of the seasons or the shape of a river pebble. Indeed, the more we find to love, the more we add to the measure of our hearts.”

Even in a fantasy realm, growing up is accomplished not without cost.

"I have marched in many a battle host," Adaon answered quietly, "but I have also planted seeds and reaped the harvest with my own hands. And I have learned there is greater honor in a field well plowed than in a field steeped in blood."

“Believe what you like. You'll be surprised how comforting it is.”

“I ask no comfort,” Taran replied, “but the truth, be it harsh or happy.”

Is there not glory enough in living the days given to us? You should know there is adventure in simply being among those we love and the things we love, and beauty, too.

Child, child, do you not see? For each of us comes a time when we must be more than what we are.

The destinies of men are woven one with the other, and you can turn aside from them no more than you can turn aside from your own.

We hold each other’s lives in our open hands, not in clenched fists.