God's reasons for communicating with man must be subsumed under his reason for communicating to him his account of his creation of the world - and man.

One cannot refute what one has not thoroughly understood.

The silence of a wise man is always meaningful.

Education to perfect gentlemanship, to human excellence, liberal education consists in reminding oneself of human excellence, of human greatness.

Life is too short to live with any but the greatest books.

Nothing ought to be said or done which could create the impression that unbiased reconsideration of the most elementary premises of philosophy is a merely academic or historical affair.

For try as one may to expel nature with a hayfork, it will always come back.

If the highest things are unknowable, then the highest capacity or virtue of man cannot be theoretical wisdom.

Liberal education reminds those members of a mass democracy who have ears to hear, of human greatness.

It is as absurd to expect members of philosophy departments to be philosophers as it is to expect members of art departments to be artists.

The contemporary rejection of natural right leads to nihilism - nay, it is identical with nihilism.

For the sake of the aftermath.

No one chooses his parent or childhood, but you can choose your own direction. Everyone has problems and obstacles to overcome.

Taking no chances means wasting your dreams..

Everything in the world may be endured except continual prosperity.

Most people like hard work, particularly when they're paying for it.

I think the reason I am important is that I know everything.

Streets and their sidewalks-the main public places of a city-are its most vital organs.

Impossible not to imagine the dead observing us. Our love for them a soft, shimmering gossamar that trails behind us.

I swear by this song and by all that I have done wrong, I will make it all up to thee.

I would love to play Nefertiti or Cleopatra or the Queen of Sheba. We preserve more male history than we do female. We have to preserve [female history]. No more complaining. We have to do it.