For writing a first draft requires from the writer a peculiar internal state which ordinary life does not induce. ... how to set yourself spinning?

Does anything eat flowers. I couldn't recall having seen anything eat a flower - are they nature's privileged pets?

Those of us who read carried around with us like martyrs a secret knowledge, a secret joy, and a secret hope: There is a life worth living where history is still taking place; there are ideas worth dying for, and circumstances where courage is still prized.

We are here to bring to consciousness the beauty and power that are around us and to praise the people who are here with us.

What have we been doing all these centuries but trying to call God back to the mountain, or, failing that, raise a peep out of anything that isn't us? What is the difference between a cathedral and a physics lab? Are not they both saying: Hello? We spy on whales and on interstellar radio objects; we starve ourselves and pray till we're blue.

I woke at intervals until . . . the intervals of waking tipped the scales, and I was more often awake than not.

Every day is a god, each day is a god, and holiness holds forth in time.