Activity does not necessarily mean life. Quasars are active. And a monk meditating is not inanimate.

The basic tool for the manipulation of reality is the manipulation of words. If you can control the meaning of words, you can control the people who must use the words.

There will come a time when it isn't 'They're spying on me through my phone' anymore. Eventually, it will be 'My phone is spying on me'.

Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away.

Everything in life is just for a while.

It is sometimes an appropriate response to reality to go insane.

Reality is just a point of view.

There is no route out of the maze. The maze shifts as you move through it, because it is alive.

To fight the Empire is to be infected by its derangement.... Whoever defeats the Empire becomes the Empire; it proliferates like a virus.

Just because something bears the aspect of the inevitable one should not, therefore, go along willingly with it.

…we all lie to ourselves; we tell our own selves more lies than we ever do other people.

In an evil society a villain is the hero, because only the villain can speak the truth.

Make the best use of what is in your power, and take the rest as it happens.

I never knew I had the power to hurt him, only that he possessed the power to hurt me.

Until recently, I thought 'occasional poetry' meant that you wrote only occasionally.

The flourishing life cannot be achieved until we moderate our desires and see how superficial and fleeting they are.

Placemaking is community organizing. It's a campaign.

Another of our highly prized virtues is fidelity. We are immensely pleased with ourselves when we are faithful.

Ah! The seasons of love roll not backward but onward, downward forever.

It is chiefly through books that we enjoy intercourse with superior minds; and these invaluable communications are within the reach of all.

If it were proven that there is no God there would be no religion. ...But also if it were proven that there is a God, there would be no religion.