Vietnam should have taught us that nationalism, with its engines of independence and self-determination, is a more powerful force by far than Marxism and must be understood and respected.

I don't ask for the meaning of the song of a bird or the rising of the sun on a misty morning. There they are, and they are beautiful.

He tried to imagine the sound of the color red.

Don't tell me about the world. Not today. It's springtime and they're knocking baseball around fields where the grass is damp and green in the morning and the kids are trying to hit the curve ball.

For those without money, the road to the treasure house of the imagination begins at the public library.

In the end, the only thing the true New Yorker knows about New York is that it is unknowable.

Writing is the hardest work in the world not involving heavy lifting.

More than anything, it's a game of innocence. Politicians may come and go, but they always get booed at the ballpark.

It's odd being an American now. Most of us are peaceful, but here we are again, in our fifth major war of this century.

The library is a place where most of the things I came to value as an adult had their beginnings.

This is truly marvelous work full of mystery, nostalgia, joy, The Color of Whimsy.

To attain power, one must first obtain riches, for almost everything of the world revolves about it.

Everything's better with zombies - NOT

Looking at the past must only be a means of understanding more clearly what and who they are so that they can more wisely build the future.

And Oliver North was really a good soldier, up to the last moment, shoving memos into the shredder and defending the policy to the end.

When you see people on the street, they're living in their phones. They aren't living where they are - they haven't got the energy of the past. And so it's something that needs to be reestablished.

But Jesus always leaves the ninety-nine to chase after the one. He always searches for the one lost coin.

I believe that contentment or any sustained period of joy that doesn't inspire thought that leads to action almost immediately is useless.

A fair question could be posed in this fashion: If people are not obeying existing laws, what makes us think they would obey any new laws?

Hark! She is called, the parting hour is come. Take thy farewell, poor world! Heaven must go home. . . .

Life and death, union and separation, follow hard upon one another. Nothing is steadfast but the will, nothing endures but one's achieve­ments. These alone count in life.