If we listened to our intellect, we’d never have a love affair... or go into business. You’ve got to jump off cliffs and build your wings on the way down.

Experiencing the present purely is being empty and hollow; you catch grace as a man fills his cup under a waterfall.

If we were to judge nature by common sense or likelihood, we wouldn't believe the world existed.

Self-consciousness is the curse of the city and all that sophistication implies.

Nature's silence is its one remark, and every flake of world is a chip off that old mute and immutable block.

One of the few things I know about writing is this: spend it all, shoot it, play it, lose it, all, right away, every time. Do not hoard what seems good for a later place in the book, or for another book; give it, give it all, give it now. . . . Something more will arise for later, something better. These things fill from behind, from beneath, like well water. Similarly, the impulse to keep to yourself what you have learned is not only shameful, it is destructive. Anything you do not give freely and abundantly becomes lost to you. You open your safe and find ashes.

The world is wider in all directions, more dangerous and bitter, more extravagant and bright. We are making hay when we should be making whoopee; we are raising tomatoes when we should be raising Cain and Lazarus.