Everything ultimately fails, for we die, and that is either the penultimate failure or our most enigmatical achievement.

Those who write for lucre or fame are grosser than the cartel robbers, for they steal the genius of the people, which is its will to resist evil.

To write is a humiliation.

So much of our lives is given over to the consideration of our imperfections that there is no time to improve our imaginary virtues. The truth is we only perfect our vices, and man is a worse creature when he dies than he was when he was born.

The ancients understood the regulation of power better than the regulation of liberty.

No country has suffered so much from the ruins of war while being at peace as the American.

Men are mad most of their lives; few live sane, fewer die so. The acts of people are baffling unless we realize that their wits are disordered. Man is driven to justice by his lunacy.