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367 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1988
It was a truism, even in the highly ethical world of Hexamon politics, that no governing system could survive a totally rigorous enforcement of its own laws.
"During your journey, you might have forgotten one thing about humans," Lanier suggested.
"Obviously. What thing?"
We're a perverse group of sons of bitches."
What a shock... to find the past full of people who knew nothing of psychological medicine, people with... minds as distorted as the bodies of people in ancient times, gnomish, shriveled, withered, ugly, clinging to their ragged personalities, cherishing their warps and diseases, fearful of some mandated, standard mental health that might make them all alike. People too ignorant to see that there are as many varieties of healthy thinking as there are diseased; perhaps more.
"You were decent. You did your work and did not ask for thanks. You are the reason I survived to make our long journey, and come back now. In every situation, there can be a seed crystal of goodness and decency, of sensibility. You were that crystal..."