For an artist to think in terms of success is like a priest trying to think in terms of success.

A ruling passion gives to a shelf of novels the unity of a system.

Never presume yours is a better morality.

When you visualized a man or a woman carefully, you could always begin to feel pity . . . that was a quality God's image carried with it . . . when you saw the lines at the corners of the eyes, the shape of the mouth, how the hair grew, it was impossible to hate. Hate was just a failure of imagination.

The world doesn't make any heroes anymore.

Hope was an instinct only the reasoning human mind could kill. An animal never knew despair.

I have often noticed that a bribe has that effect - it changes a relation. The man who offers a bribe gives away a little of his own importance; the bribe once accepted, he becomes the inferior, like a man who has paid for a woman.