There is a totalitarian regime inside every one of us. We are ruled by a ruthless politburo which sets our norms and drives us from one five-year plan to another. The autonomous individual who has to justify his existence by his own efforts is in eternal bondage to himself.

Compassion alone stands apart from the continuous traffic between good and evil proceeding within us.

Often, the thing we pursue most passionately is but a substitute for the one thing we really want and cannot have.

People haunted by the purposelessness of their lives try to find a new content not only by dedicating themselves to a holy cause but also by nursing a fanatical grievance. A mass movement offers them unlimited opportunities for both.

You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.

It is a sign of creeping inner death when we can no longer praise the living.

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.