Politics is so difficult, it's generally only people who aren't quite up to the task who feel convinced they are.

We should not feel embarrassed by our difficulties, only by our failure to grow anything beautiful from them.

It is in books, poems, paintings which often give us the confidence to take seriously feelings in ourselves that we might otherwise never have thought to acknowledge.

Many moments in religion seem attractive to me even though I can't believe in any of it.

The true nature of bureaucracy may be nowhere more obvious to the observer than in a developing country, for only there will it still be made manifest by the full complement of documents, files, veneered desks and cabinets - which convey the strict and inverse relationship between productivity and paperwork.

We should keep a careful diary of our moments of envy: they are our covert guides to what we should try to do next.

Don't despair: despair suggests you are in total control and know what is coming. You don't - surrender to events with hope.