With the possible exception of the equator, everything begins somewhere.

[The natural life] knows that if the spiritual life gets hold of it, all its self-centredness and self-will are going to be killed and it is ready to fight tooth and nail to avoid that.

Literature adds to reality, it does not simply describe it.

Whenever you are fed up with life, start writing: ink is the great cure for all human ills, as I have found out long ago.

Unless thought is valid we have no reason to believe in the real universe.

Where men are forbidden to honour a king, they honor millionaires, athletes, or film stars instead; even famous prostitutes or gangsters. For spiritual nature, like bodily nature, will be served; deny it food and it will gobble poison.

There must, whether the gods see it or not, be something great in the mortal soul. For suffering, it seems, is infinite, and our capacity without limit.