“And I hope you gave thanks to the gods for your salvation?” “Gave…thanks?” said Mau. “They may have plans… — Terry Pratchett
“And I hope you gave thanks to the gods for your salvation?”
“Gave…thanks?” said Mau.
“They may have plans for you,” said the priest cheerfully.
“Plans,” said Mau, his voice as cold as the dark current. “Plans? Yes, I see. Someone must be alive to bury the rest, was that it?” He took a step forward, his fists clenched.
“We cannot know the reasons for all that happ–” Ataba began, backing away.
“I saw their faces!” I sent them into the dark water! I tied small stones to little bodies. The wave took everyone I love, and everything I am wants to know why!”
“Why did the waves spare you? Why did it spare me? Why did it spare that baby which will die soon enough? Why does it rain? How many stars are in the sky? We cannot know these things! Just be thankful that the gods spared your life!” shouted the old man.
“I will not! To thank them for my life means I thank them for the deaths. I want to find reasons. I want to understand the reasons! But I can’t because there are no reasons. Things happen or do not happen, and that is all there is!”
p. 102Source: Wikiquote · CC BY-SA 4.0
More from this book
“That’s unfair!” said Daphne.
“No, it’s science,” said her father. “‘Could have’ isn’t good enough. Nor is ‘might have’! ‘Did’ is the trick.”
p. 335
No one stuck up their hands and there was no voting, but she thought, I wonder if it was like this in ancient Athens? This is pure democracy. People don’t just get a vote; they have a say.
p. 276
“What about the hangman? Doesn’t he do murder, then?”
[No, because enough people say it isn’t. That’s what a courtroom is for. It’s where the law happens.]
“And that makes it right? Didn’t God say, ‘Thou shalt not kill’?”
[Yes. But after that it got complicated.]
p. 260
