What I want is to live of that initial and primordial something that was what made some things reach the point of aspiring to be human.

Reality prior to my language exists as an unthinkable thought. . . . life precedes love, bodily matter precedes the body, and one day in its turn language shall have preceded possession of silence.

I' is merely one of the world's instantaneous spasms.

The world's continual breathing is what we hear and call silence.

In the world there exists no aesthetic plane, not even the aesthetic plane of goodness.

Honesty rare as a man without self-pity Kindness as large and plain as a prairie wind.

We Orientals find beauty not only in the thing itself but in the pattern of the shadows, the light and darkness which that thing provides.

Be a creator, not a reactor.

A man can be an artist... in anything, food, whatever. It depends on how good he is at it. Creasey's art is death. He's about to paint his masterpiece.

Every man eventually is backed up to the wall of faith, and there he must make his stand.

Martyrs do not underrate the body, they allow it to be elevated on the cross. In this they are at one with their antagonists.

You speak of poverty and dependence. Who are poor and dependent? Who are rich and independent? When was it that men agreed to respect the appearance and not the reality?

It has always been the opinion and judgment of wise men that nothing can be so uncertain as fame or power not founded on its own strength.

These are icons to be treasured.

True contentment comes with empathy.