We can never really be prepared for that which is wholly new. We have to adjust ourselves, and every radical adjustment is a crisis in self-esteem: we undergo a test, we have to prove ourselves. It needs subordinate self-confidence to face drastic change without inner trembling.

The real persuaders are our appetites, our fears and above all our vanity. The skillful propagandist stirs and coaches these internal persuaders.

It is startling to realize how much unbelief is necessary to make belief possible.

A preoccupation with the future not only prevents us from seeing the present as it is but often prompts us to rearrange the past.

We have rudiments of reverence for the human body, but we consider as nothing the rape of the human mind.

However different the holy causes people die for, they perhaps die basically for the same thing.

To a man utterly without a sense of belonging, mere life is all that matters. It is the only reality in an eternity of nothingness, and he clings to it with shameless despair.