All 'isms' run out in the end, and good riddance to most of them. Patriotism for example. [...] If in the interest of making sure we don't blow ourselves off the map once and for all, we end up relinquishing a measure of national sovereignty to some international body, so much the worse for national sovereignty. There is only one Sovereignty that matters ultimately, and it is of another sort altogether.

The magic of words is that they have power to do more than convey meaning; not only do they have the power to make things clear, they make things happen.

Whenever you find tears in your eyes, especially unexpected tears, it is well to pay the closest attention.

My story is important not because it is mine, God knows, but because if I tell it anything like right, the chances are you will recognize that in many ways it is also yours.

If what makes you happy is going out and living it up and spending all your money on wine, women, and song, the world doesn't need that. But on the other hand, if you give your life to good works - you go and work in a leper colony and it doesn't make you happy - the chances are you're not doing it very well.

Pay attention to the things that bring a tear to your eye or a lump in your throat because they are signs that the holy is drawing near.

... the world can give you these glimpses as well as fairy tales can--the smell of rain, the dazzle of sun on white clapboard with the shadows of ferns and wash on the line, the wildness of a winter storm when in the house the flame of a candle doesn't even flicker.