Terry Goodkind Quotes

That’s the worst part, that so many would not value their own unique abilities, not value themselves, much less respect those who have fought and died so that they could live free to make the choice to surrender that precious right of choice –long with their gift and individuality.”She gripped the blanket in a fist. “I often think that the y deserve everything they’re going to get. I only regret that those of us who value what we have will suffer the same fate. They’re the ones I fight for. The rest of them be damned.”Alex swallowed at the pain so clearly evident in her voice. “We have people like that in our world, too. People who say that freedom is no longer practical, that we must surrender it for a greater common good.”“Fear them,” she whispered. “They are the heart of evil. They tolerate tyranny, excuse it, compromise with it. In doing so they always bring savagery and death upon the rest of us.
Terry Goodkind
Information is the coin of war.
Terry Goodkind
But this was no ordinary chicken. This chicken was evil manifest.
Terry Goodkind
Charity, if you have the means, is a personal choice, but charity which is expected or compelled is simply a polite word for slavery.
Terry Goodkind
Dance with me, Death, I am ready.
Terry Goodkind
If I was a nobody you wouldn't be so eager to see me dead. Just like these people you know that I am devoted to the truth. That is why you want to eliminate me." - Magda Searus
Terry Goodkind
The dead must heed them.
Terry Goodkind
This was the threshold to the place of the dead.
Terry Goodkind
Enemies,' the wizard said, 'are the price of honour.
Terry Goodkind
Safety is only an illusion when evil is on the hunt. I can't stand by and watch. I have to act. It isn't easy to absolve one's self of guilt.
Terry Goodkind
Reasons are the spoils of victory. When you've destroyed the enemy, then your leaders write down the reasons in books, and give moving speeches about them. If you've done your job, then there aren't any of the enemy left to dispute your leader's reasons. At least not until the next war.
Terry Goodkind
Richard rubbed his temples. He had a headache from lack of sleep. "Don't you understand? This isn't about conquering lands and taking things from others; this is about fighting oppression."The general rested a boot on the gilded rung of a chair and hooked a thumb behind his wide belt. "I don't see much difference. From my experience, the Master Rahl always thinks he knows best, and always wants to rule the world. You are your father's son. War is war. Reasons make no difference to us; we fight because we are told to, same as those on the other side. Reasons mean little to a man swinging his sword, trying to keep his head.
Terry Goodkind
People use democracy as a free-floating abstraction disconnected from reality. Democracy in and of itself is not necessarily good. Gang rape, after all, is democracy in action.All men have the right to live their own life. Democracy must be rooted in a rational philosophy that first and foremost recognizes the right of an individual. A few million Imperial Order men screaming for the lives of a much smaller number of people in the New World may win a democratic vote, but it does not give them the right to those lives, or make their calls for such killing right.Democracy is not a synonym for justice or for freedom. Democracy is not a sacred right sanctifying mob rule. Democracy is a principle that is subordinate to the inalienable rights of the individual.
Terry Goodkind
In the darkest hours we must believe in ourselves.
Terry Goodkind
He put the box in Kahlan's lap. As she picked it up, she gave him the biggest smile he had ever seen. Before he even knew what he had done, he had leaned over and given Kahlan a quick kiss. Her eyes went wide, and she didn't kiss him back, but the feel of her lips shocked him into realizing what he had done.Oh. Sorry," he said.She laughed. "Forgiven.
Terry Goodkind
Thunder without sound jolted the air around her. The violence of it was magnificent, immaculate, glorious.
Terry Goodkind
Freedom requires effort if it is to be won and vigilance if it is to be maintained. People just don't value freedom until it is taken away.
Terry Goodkind
Mercy is a contingency plan, devised by the guilty in the eventuality that they are caught. Justice is the domain of the just. - Richard Rahl
Terry Goodkind
Pity for the guilty is treason to the innocent.
Terry Goodkind
The truth has value.
Terry Goodkind
I'm afraid that we all make mistakes. One of the things that defines our character is how we handle mistakes. If we lie about having made a mistake, then it can't be corrected and it festers. On the other hand, if we give up just because we made a mistake, even a big mistake, none of us would get far in life.
Terry Goodkind
Rising to her feet, she shot the Bird Man a furious glare, and then stormed off toward Savidlin's house. She was glad to be away from Richard, to be away from watching those girls pawing him.Her fingernails dug into her palms, but she didn't notice as she marched past the happy people. The dancers danced, the drummers drummed, the children laughed. People she passed wished her well. She wanted one of them to say something mean so she would have an excuse to hit someone.
Terry Goodkind
The chicken thing let out a whispering cackle.
Terry Goodkind
Life connects us all to magic, as illustrated through the design of the Grace. So, for a Confessor, I don't need a gifted person, just a living one.
Terry Goodkind
The Grace represented the world of life, the world of the dead, and the way magic and Creation linked them. The outer circle of the design represented the beginning of the infinite world of the dead. Inside the outer circle was a square, its points just touching the outer circle. Inside the square was another circle, just touching the insides of the square. The area between those two circles with the square represented the world of life. The inside circle was life's beginnings, the outer circle its end, where souls crossed through the veil into the eternity of the underworld. An eight-pointed star inside the smaller circle was the Light of Creation. Lines from the star's points radiated out across the inner circle. the square. and across the outer circle that also symbolized the veil to the wold of the dead. The lines radiating outward from the Light represented the spark of the gift that journeyed with everyone from birth, through life, and on into death.
Terry Goodkind
The Grace represents the interconnection of everything, the world of life and the world of the dead, Additive and Subtractive, as well as the spark of the gift that runs though it all. The Grace does more though, than simply represent Additive and Subtractive magic, Creation and obliteration, life and death, it connects them into a cohesive whole. The power of Orden deals with life, death and the whole nature of existence so the key also needs to have both sides. It needs both Additive and Subtractive, life and death to be complete.
Terry Goodkind
Why people wanted to dance whenever it got dark was beyond him. Somehow, the two seemed to go together, like bees and flowers, or flies and dung. Darkness and dancing.
Terry Goodkind
Don't give up the calling, Magda. Know yourself. Know what you are. Though few would admit it, even those on the council, I truly believe we all need you. - Councilman Sadler
Terry Goodkind
...think of the solution, not the problem. If your mind was filled only with thoughts of why you were going to lose, then you couldn't think of how to win.
Terry Goodkind
Are we our bodies? Is a small person less than a big person, then? If we were our bodies, then when we lost an arm, or a leg, would we be less, would we begin to fade from existence? No. We are the same person.We are not our bodies; we are our thoughts. As they form, they define who we are, and create the reality of our existence.
Terry Goodkind
Eliminate the tyranny of magic from mankind.
Terry Goodkind
Chickens can move and flop for hours after their heads are cut off. They have no heartbeat either," Naja said, "and that doesn't involve magic.
Terry Goodkind
A Grace connected creating the World of life, and the world of the dead in pathways of magic.
Terry Goodkind
Without delay, Tilly entered the ninth opening, a number that she knew from Baraccus had great meaning on things having to do with magic.
Terry Goodkind
Anger is a shield for the power of the sword's magic, so that helped.
Terry Goodkind
Only those you trust can betray you.
Terry Goodkind
As it turns out, that persistence is a requirement. Thus, he would tell me, you need the dark to show the light, so you shouldn't curse darkness. You needed death to define life.
Terry Goodkind
This was life as it should be lived—proud, reasoned, and a slave to no other man.
Terry Goodkind
In the end, people believed what they wanted to believe. The truth had very little to do with it.
Terry Goodkind
Life is not about fulfilling a destiny. Your life has no destiny but what you make of it. And this is what I want to make of it. Barracus also told me to live the life that only I can live. He told me to have the courage to take up that calling. He was asking me to choose my destiny. Prophecy is not only about destiny, but the balance of free will. Becoming a Confessor is my calling. But it's not pre-ordained. It's a chance, a fork in the road of my life. I have to have the courage to take it on of my free will. In that way, the balance of prophecy and free will is the magic of the future.
Terry Goodkind
Your destiny is to find the truth.
Terry Goodkind
Nicci looked up at Kahlan. “Knives are not my talent.” “It’s not hard,” Kahlan said as she pressed the handle into Nicci’s hand. “When the time is right, just stick the pointed end somewhere important in someone you really don’t like.
Terry Goodkind
The foundations of some formerly strong lands became so riddled with termites of diminished purpose, so decayed with the decadence of smug moderation, and so emaciated with the vacillating aims of appears, that even when they saw the enemy coming and did resist, they were easily toppled when the Imperial Order finally pushed.
Terry Goodkind
Cara, in the lead, came to a halt beside them, looking from one to the other. "Still with the clothes, Lord Rahl?
Terry Goodkind
Cara waggled a hand over the two of them. "It works better with your clothes off."Richard frowned. His voice came as a hoarse croak. "What?"She seemed mystified by the question. "I believe you will find such things work better without clothes." She put her hands to her hips. "I thought you would know at least that much.
Terry Goodkind
Honor is honesty to what is, not blind duty to what you wish to be.
Terry Goodkind
Baraccus had told her that while a number of wizards could make things, the same as the ungifted could make things, it was this component of artistic ability in creating new things that took to to another level and made the makers more than true prophets. Magda remembered the passion in his voice as he told her about such things. Making things was in his soul. Creating new things seemed to be his spark of life.
Terry Goodkind
Sometimes, making the wrong choice is better than making no choice. You have the courage to go forward, that is rare. A person who stands at the fork, unable to pick, will never get anywhere.
Terry Goodkind
When the whole world is crazy, it doesn't pay to be sane.
Terry Goodkind
There is no place so dangerous as a world without magic.
Terry Goodkind
...Wizard's Fifth Rule: Mind what people do, not only what they say, for deeds will betray a lie.
Terry Goodkind
Richard looked up at the beautiful, big pines spreading over them, illuminated in the firelight. A spark of understanding lit in his mind. He saw the branches stretched out with murderous intent in a years-long struggle to reach the sunlight and dispatch its neighbors with its shade. Success would give space for its offspring, many of which would also shrivel in the shade of the parent. Several close neighbors of the big pine were withered and weak, victims all. It was true. The design of nature was success by murder.
Terry Goodkind
I never could understand why some writers treat women as helpless. Every woman I know is strong in her own unique way.
Terry Goodkind
Free people were not ruled. Freedom had first to be valued before its existence could be demanded.
Terry Goodkind
There were those who loved liberty, who cried out to live their own lives, to strive, to rise above, to achieve, and those bent on the mindless equality of stagnation brought about through the enforcement of an artificial, arbitrary, gray uniformity--those who wanted to transcend through their own effort, and those who wanted others to think for them and were willing to pay the ultimate price.
Terry Goodkind
If you want to be a slave in life, then continue going around asking others to do for you. They will oblige, but you will find the price is your choices, your freedom, your life itself. They will do for you, and as a result you will be in bondage to them forever, having given your identity away for a paltry price. Then, and only then, you will be a nobody, a slave, because you yourself and nobody else made it so.
Terry Goodkind
Knowing when to fight is just as important as knowing how.
Terry Goodkind
...you'll find that being a friend is to like a person for who they are, even the parts you don't understand. You don't have to understand, or do the same, or live their lives for them. If you truly care for them, then you want them to be who they are; that was why you liked them in the first place.
Terry Goodkind
Fear triggers need, need powers sincerity. Sincerity is the required element.
Terry Goodkind
Being afraid something is true is accepting the possibility. Accepting the possibility is the first step to believing. At least you are smart enough to question. Think of how easy it is to believe, for people who don't question, who don't even know how to question. For most people, it's not the truth that is important, it's the cause. Rahl is intelligent; he has given them a cause.
Terry Goodkind