She started off, walking fast, as if the speed of her steps could give form to the things she felt.

In a fully free society, taxation-or, to be exact, payment for governmental services-would be voluntary.

The more neurotic and evasive a person is, the shorter the range of his interests.

The view that man was ever to be drawn by some vision of the unattainable shining ahead, doomed ever to aspire, but not to achieve, my life and my values could not bring me to that.

Love should be treated like a business deal, but every business deal has its own terms and its own currency. And in love, the currency is virtue. You love people not for what you do for them or what they do for you. You love them for the values, the virtues, which they have achieved in their own character.

He liked to observe emotions; they were like red lanterns strung along the dark unknown of another's personality, marking vulnerable points.

Andrei, did you like the opera?" "Not particularly." "Andrei, do you see what you're missing?" "I don't think I do, Kira. It's all rather silly. And useless." "Can't you enjoy things that are useless, merely because they are beautiful?" "No. But I enjoyed it." "The music?" "No. The way you listened to it.