What with making their way and enjoying what they have won, heroes have no time to think. But the sons of heroes - ah, they have all the necessary leisure.

Actual happiness always looks pretty squalid in comparison with the overcompensations for misery. And, of course, stability isn't nearly so spectacular as instability. And being contented has none of the glamour of a good fight against misfortune, none of the picturesqueness of a struggle with temptation, or a fatal overthrow by passion or doubt. Happiness is never grand.

Every ceiling, when reached, becomes a floor, upon which one walks as a matter of course and prescriptive right

Grace is always sufficient, provided we are ready to cooperate with it.

Indifference to all the refinements of life--it's really shocking. Just Calvinism, that's all. Calvinism without the excuse of Calvin's theology.

If the men of the Middle Ages... lived in filth and discomfort, it was not for any lack of ability to change their mode of life; it was because they chose to live this way, because filth and discomfort fitted in with their principles and prejudices, political, moral, and religious.... It was in the power of medieval... craftsmen to create armchairs and sofas that might have rivaled in comfort those of today

Plasticene and self-expression will not solve the problems of education. Nor will technology and vocational guidance; nor the classics and the Hundred Best Books.