# Quote — Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!

> He felt the sensation of the dragon rummaging around in his mind, trying to find a clue to understanding. He half-saw, half-sensed the flicker of random images, of dragons, of the mythical age of reptiles and—and here he felt the dragon's genuine astonishment—of some of the less commendable areas of human history, which were most of it. And after the astonishment came the baffled anger. There was practically nothing the dragon could do to people that they had not, sooner or later, tried on one another, often with enthusiasm.

- Author: [Terry Pratchett](https://www.leafyquotes.com/terry-pratchett.md)
- Book: [Guards! Guards!](https://www.leafyquotes.com/terry-pratchett/guards-guards.md)
- Page: 253
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Guards!_Guards!#Quotes) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/terry-pratchett/guards-guards/he-felt-the

## More from this book

> Up in the gloom the heads of dead animals haunted the walls. The Ramkins seemed to have endangered more species than an ice age. (p. 349)

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/terry-pratchett/guards-guards/up-in-the.md)

> "Down there," he said, "are people who will follow any dragon, worship any god, ignore any iniquity. All out of a kind of humdrum, everyday badness. Not the really high, creative loathesomeness of the great sinners, but a sort of mass-produced darkness of the soul. Sin, you might say, without a trace of originality. They accept evil not because they say yes, but because they don't say no." (p. 337)

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/terry-pratchett/guards-guards/down-there-he-said.md)

> 'No one knows how to do officering, Fred. That's why they're officers. If they'd knew anything, they'd be sergeants.'

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/terry-pratchett/guards-guards/no-one-knows.md)