Quotes About Control

Listen, happy endings is fine if they turn out happy," said Granny, glaring at the sky. "But you can't make 'em for other people. Like the only way you could make a happy marriage is by cuttin' their heads off as soon as they say 'I do', yes? You can't make happiness…" Granny Weatherwax stared at the distant city. "All you can do," she said, "is make an ending.

Anger was a weapon to be honed and treasured and used only at the moment yielding most premium.

Stopping a battle is much harder than starting it. Starting it only requires you to shout 'Attack!' but when you want to stop it, everyone is busy.

Genua had once controlled the river mouth and taxed its traffic in a way that couldn't be called piracy because it was done by the city government, and therefore sound economics and perfectly all right.

I would not like it thought that I do not buy my own paperclips, sir. I enjoy owning my own paperclips. It means they are mine.

Genuine anger was one of the world's great creative forces. But you had to learn how to control it. That didn't mean you let it trickle away. It meant you dammed it, carefully, let it develop a working head, let it drown whole valleys of the mind and then, just when the whole structure was about to collapse, opened a tiny pipeline at the base and let the iron-hard stream of wrath power the turbines of revenge.

Some people are born to command. Some people achieve command. And others have command thrust upon them ...

but William felt in his bones that you couldn't run a city on the basis of what the Watch liked. The Watch would probably like it if everyone spent their time indoors, with their hands on the table where people could see them.

Uncertainty is always uncertain, but the difficulty with people who rely on systems is that they begin to believe that nearly everything is in some way a system and therefore, sooner or later, they become bureaucrats.

People in chains had a tendency to look guilty.

The politics of wizardry were either very simple, and resolved by someone ceasing to breathe, or as complex as one ball of yarn in a room with three bright-eyed little kittens.

To be a leader you have to learn to shout! But after you've learned to shout, you have to learn not to!

never ask the tight-rope walker how he keeps his balance. if he stops to think about it, he falls off

A foot on the neck is nine points of the law.

Governments govern, but prime ministers and presidents do not personally turn up in people's homes to tell them how to run their lives, because of the mortal danger this would present. There are laws instead.

Though here's a tip, though. Just 'ho, ho, ho' will do. Don't say, 'Cower, brief mortals' unless you want them to grow up to be moneylenders or some such.

Listen, happy endings is fine if they turn out happy," said Granny, glaring at the sky. "But you can't make 'em for other people. Like the only way you could make a happy marriage is by cuttin' their heads off as soon as they say 'I do', yes? You can't make happiness…

There's the basic unwritten rule of witchcraft, which is "Don't do what you will, do what I say.

You must make a place for fear, fear under control. We think that the head is important, that the brain sits like a monarch on the throne of the body. But the body is powerful too, and the brain cannot survive without it.

It was the terror of impermanence, the knowledge that all this would pass away, that a beautiful voice or a wonderful figure was something whose arrival you couldn't control and whose departure you couldn't delay.

you cannot apply brakes to a volcano. Sometimes it is best to let these things run their course. They generally die down again after a while.

anger was better than fear. Fear was a damp cold mess, but anger had an edge. She could use it.

A good shouting at somebody always makes you feel better and in control, especially if you aren't.

Kasandra took charge of things. She was the most organized person Johnny knew. In fact she was so organized that she had too much organization for one person, and it overflowed in every direction.