The birth of Christ is the central event in the history of the earth-- the very thing the whole story has been about.

When I have learned to love God better than my earthly dearest, I shall love my earthly dearest better than I do now.

You never know how much you really believe anything until its truth or falsehood becomes a matter of life and death to you.

Because we love something else more than this world, we love even this world more than those who know no other.

The next best thing to being wise oneself is to live in a circle of those who are.

I'm not sure God wants us to be happy. I think he wants us to love, and be loved. But we are like children, thinking our toys will make us happy and the whole world is our nursery. Something must drive us out of that nursery and into the lives of others, and that something is suffering.

The very condition of having Friends is that we should want something else besides Friends. Where the truthful answer to the question "Do you see the same truth?" would be "I see nothing and I don't care about the truth; I only want a Friend," no Friendship can arise - though Affection of course may. There would be nothing for the Friendship to be about; and Friendship must be about something, even if it were only an enthusiasm for dominoes or white mice. Those who have nothing can share nothing; those who are going nowhere can have no fellow-travellers.