But I didn’t realize then that the consequence of sin is that you have to trample on other people.

The reason why I hated school so intensely [was that] it interfered with my freedom.

It’s a good thing when you don’t dare do something if you don’t think it’s right. But it’s not good when you think something’s not right because you don’t dare do it.

No one and nothing can harm us, child, except what we fear and love.

All my days I have longed equally to travel the right road and to take my own errant path.

All things that a man owns hold him far more than he holds them.

One cannot escape dogmas—those who hold most firmly to dogmas today are those whose only dogma is that dogmas should be feared like the plague.

The morality code that remains after the religion that produced it is rejected is like the perfume that lingers in an empty bottle.

Many a man is given what is intended for another, but no man is given another's fate.

I went to work in an office and learned, among other lessons, to do things I did not care for, and to do them well. Before I left this office, two of my books had already been published.

Easy for them to keep their youth who will never learn a lesson.

Beliefs are not related to religion but they are basically about who you are.

Expectation works in mysterious ways---and totally unconsciously.

The bite of conscience is indecent.

What compels me to write now is the same as all those years ago. It is the love of writing and storytelling, driven by a desire to escape.

A bitter thing cannot be made sweet. The taste of anything can be changed. But poison cannot be changed into nectar

I've never been one that thinks that the function of an instrument is to approach the purity of voice or the structure of a beautifully sung line.

She turned so they were face-to-face and gave him back the words he'd offered her their first night together: "I survived. Isn't that what matters?

The one absolute certain way to bring this nation to ruin ... would be to permit it to become a tangle of squabbling nationalities.

The problem is that people think faith is something to be admired. In fact, faith means you believe in something for which you have no evidence.

Responsibility is the choice we make to respond with care.