Officials are highly educated but one-sided; in his own department an official can grasp whole trains of thought from a single word, but let him have something from another department explained to him ... he won't understand a word of it.

This noble body, equipped with everything necessary, almost to the point of bursting, also appeared to carry freedom around with it.

To write prescriptions is easy, but to come to an understanding with people is hard.

If they were shocked, then Gregor had no further responsibility and could be calm. But if they took everything calmly, he he, too, had no reason to get excited and could, if he hurried, actually be at the station by eight o'clock.

It is only our conception of time that makes us call the Last Judgement by this name. It is, in fact, a kind of martial law.

I am always trying to convey something that can’t be conveyed, to explain something which is inexplicable, to tell about something I have in my bones, something which can be expressed only in the bones.

Test yourself on mankind. It is something that makes the doubter doubt, the believer believe.