there is only one thing we do know and that is that we do not know anything.

her age was that indeterminate mixture of everlasting youth and anticipated wisdom which is the glory and the curse of genius.

the curse of human nature is imagination. When a long anticipated moment comes, we always find it pitched a note too low, for the wings of imagination are crushed into its withering sides under the crowding hordes of petty realities.

orthodoxy is a fixed habit of mind. The average man and woman hug their orthodoxies and spit their venom on those that outrage them.

The world changed somewhat in form during its progress, but never in substance.

power, after it has ceased from troubling, is the dominant passion in human nature.

I want books written out of a brain and heart and soul crowded and vital with Life, spelled with a big L. I want poetry bursting with passion. I don't care a hang for the 'verbal felicities.' They'll do for the fringe, but I want the garment to warm me first.