In the end I worked out an anarchistic theory that all government is evil, that the punishment always does more harm than the crime and that people can be trusted to behave decently if only you will let them alone.

Imperialism as he [Kipling] sees it is a sort of forcible evangelising.

The war is waged against its own subjects and its object is not the victory...but to keep the very structure of society intact.

All the war-propaganda, all the screaming and lies and hatred, comes invariably from people who are not fighting.

He had moved from thought to words, and now from words to actions.

It is a mysterious thing, the loss of faith—as mysterious as faith itself.

Many people genuinely do not want to be saints, and it is probable that some who achieve or aspire to sainthood have never felt much temptation to be human beings.