My guess is that he remembers some of me, some of us together, and the rest rolled off him like topsoil in a flash flood.

When you handle books all day long, every new one is a friend and a temptation.

In those days, I still thoroughly enjoyed the romance I called "by myself"; I didn't know yet how it gets lonely, picks up a sharp edge later on that ruins a day now and then-- ruins more than that, if you're not careful.

The heart does not go backward. Only the mind.

These atheist cultures were certainly diligent in preserving the relics of their saints.

The thing that most haunted me that day, however...was the fact that these things had - apparently - actually occurred...For all his attention to my historical education, my father had neglected to tell me this: history's terrible moments were real. I understand now, decades later, that he could never have told me. Only history itself can convince you of such a truth. And once you've seen that truth - really seen it - you can't look away.

...what will we someday do, I always wonder, without the pleasures of turning through books and stumbling on things we never meant to find?