It is remarkable by how much a pinch of malice enhances the penetrating power of an idea or an opinion. Our ears, it seems, are wonderfully attuned to sneers and evil reports about our fellow men.

In human affairs, the best stimulus for running ahead is to have something we must run from.

We are least open to precise knowledge concerning the things we are most vehement about.

We can never have enough of that which we really do not want.

The true believer, no matter how rowdy and violent his acts, is basically an obedient and submissive person.

There is a radicalism in all getting, and a conservatism in all keeping. Lovemaking is radical, while marriage is conservative.

Freedom means freedom from forces and circumstances which would turn man into a thing, which would impose on man the passivity and predictability of matter. By this test, absolute power is the manifestation most inimical to human uniqueness. Absolute power wants to turn people into malleable clay.