Rebellion cannot exist without the feeling that somewhere, in some way, you are justified.

We [writers] must know that we can never escape the common misery and that our only justification, if indeed there is a justification, is to speak up, insofar as we can, for those who cannot do so.

The danger of lectures is that they create the illusion of teaching for teachers, and the illusion of learning for learners.

What will be left of the power of example if it is proved that capital punishment has another power, and a very real one, which degrades men to the point of shame, madness, and murder?

There is a life and there is a death, and there are beauty and melancholy between.

None of the evils which totalitarianism ... claims to remedy is worse than totalitarianism itself.

Old women even forget how to love their sons. The heart gets worn out, Monsieur.