Friendship (as the ancients saw) can be a school of virtue, but also (as they did not see) a school of vice. It is ambivalent. It makes good men better and bad men worse.

I have been wandering to find him and my happiness is so great that it even weakens me like a wound. And this is the marvel of marvels, that he called me Beloved, me who am but as a dog.

We are born helpless. As soon as we are fully conscious we discover loneliness.

We are not the playwright, we are not the producer, we are not even the audience. We are on the stage.

He told people that their sins were forgiven, and never waited to consult all the other people whom their sins had undoubtedly injured. He unhesitatingly behaved as if He was the party chiefly concerned, the person chiefly offended in all offenses. This makes sense only if He really was God whose laws are broken and whose love is wounded in every sin.

Praise is the mode of love which always has some element of joy in it.

We might think that God wanted simply obedience to a set of rules: whereas He really wants people of a particular sort.