• A man must make of his life a ladder that he never ceases to climb—if you’re not rising, you are slipping down the rungs, my friend.

• “It’s not really a business practice I admire. But the great marketplace is like a thriving jungle, where some survive and become king of their territory— and some don’t. It’s the way of nature! Survival of the fittest weans out the weaklings, Gravenstein! I advise you to find some means of competing—or move out.”

• Now that view, Bill thought, using a tiny screwdriver to adjust the filter, was something he could appreciate. It was a view that had helped bind him to Andrew Ryan: a man being judged on what he’d achieved, what he could do—not on class, religion, race.