At that point I asked myself: How is it that she is not amazed at herself, that she keeps her lips closed and makes no such remark?

Anyone who renounces the world must love all men, for he renounces their world too. He thus begins to have some inkling of the true nature of man, which cannot but be loved, always assuming that one is its peer.

Believing in progress does not mean believing that any progress has yet been made.

There will be no proof that I ever was a writer.

Now the Sirens have a still more fatal weapon than their song, namely their silence... someone might possibly have escaped from their singing; but from their silence, certainly never.

In Paradise, as always: that which causes the sin and that which recognizes it for what it is are one. The clear conscience is Evil, which is so entirely victorious that it does not any longer consider the leap from left to right necessary.

His biggest misgiving came from his concern about the loud crash that was bound to occur and would probably create, if not terror, at least anxiety behind all the doors. But that would have to be risked.