# Quote — Terry Pratchett, Mort

> The only things known to go faster than ordinary light is monarchy, according to the philosopher Ly Tin Weedle. He reasoned like this: you can't have more than one king, and tradition demands that there is no gap between kings, so when a king dies the succession must therefore pass to the heir instantaneously. Presumably, he said, there must be some elementary particles—kingons, or possibly queons—that do this job, but of course succession sometimes fails if, in mid-flight, they strike an anti-particle, or republicon. His ambitious plans to use his discovery to send messages, involving the careful torturing of a small king in order to modulate the signal, were never fully expanded because, at that point, the bar closed.

- Author: [Terry Pratchett](https://www.leafyquotes.com/terry-pratchett.md)
- Book: [Mort](https://www.leafyquotes.com/terry-pratchett/mort.md)
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Mort#Quotes) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/terry-pratchett/mort/the-only-things

## More from this book

> "You like it?" he said to Mort, in pretty much the same tone of voice people used when they said to St George, "You killed a what?"

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/terry-pratchett/mort/you-like-it-he-said.md)

> Albert grunted. "Do you know what happens to lads who ask too many questions?"

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/terry-pratchett/mort/albert-grunted-do-you.md)

> (That was a cinematic trick adapted for print. Death wasn't talking to the princess. He was actually in his study, talking to Mort. But it was quite effective, wasn't it? It's probably called a fast dissolve, or a crosscut/zoom. Or something. An industry where the senior technician is called a Best Boy might call it anything.)

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/terry-pratchett/mort/that-was-a-cinematic.md)