Nature
The Mule's name is a reference to the sterility of mules, since he too is genetically sterile. Without a child available as a successor, the Mule's empire ends soon after his death. No reference is ever given about any other name for him besides "The Mule", a name he apparently gave himself.
Physically, the Mule is a freak, with a long nose (at least three inches) tightly stretched facial skin, and a spindly body. His joints jut out from his diminutive musculature. The Mule's meagerness is glandular and untreatable. Furthermore, his limbs meet at awkward angles, giving the general impression of a scarecrow assembled poorly. His eyes are described as deep brown and perpetually sad. In Second Foundation, it is revealed that the Mule dies in his thirties as a result of his poor health.
As a result of the Mule's freakish appearance, his childhood is one of torment and alienation. The Mule becomes aware of his great mental powers in his twenties, and develops a desire to compensate for his earlier life by taking revenge on humanity.
Read more about this topic: Mule (Foundation)
Famous quotes containing the word nature:
“The Nature of Familiar Letters, written, as it were, to the Moment, while the Heart is agitated by Hopes and Fears, on Events undecided, must plead an Excuse for the Bulk of a Collection of this Kind. Mere Facts and Characters might be comprised in a much smaller Compass: But, would they be equally interesting?”
—Samuel Richardson (1689–1761)
“There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society where none intrudes
By the deep sea, and music in its roar:
I love not man the less, but nature more,”
—George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)
“A miracle, my friend, is an event which creates faith. That is the purpose and nature of miracles. They may seem very wonderful to the people who witness them, and very simple to those who perform them. That does not matter: if they confirm or create faith they are true miracles.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)