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

Endeavoring to purchase something we think beautiful may in fact be the most unimaginative way of dealing with the longing it excites in us, just as trying to sleep with someone may be the bluntest response to a feeling of love.

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 wanted to test each other's capacity for survival: only if we had tried in vain to destroy one another would we know we were safe.

The desire for high status is never stronger than in situations where "ordinary" life fails to answer a median need for dignity and comfort.

Happiness is impossible for longer than 15 minutes. We are the descendants of creatures who, above all else, worried.

It's as though either you accept [religious] doctrine and then you can have all the nice stuff, or you reject the doctrine and you're living in some kind of spiritual wasteland under the guidance of CNN and Walmart.