Upon the demon-ridden pilgrimage of human life, what next I wonder.

Eating reveals the characteristic grossness of the human race and also the in-built failure of its satisfactions. We arrive eager, we stuff ourselves and we go away depressed and disappointed and probably feeling a bit queasy into the bargain. It's an image of the déçu in human existence. A greedy start and a stupefied finish. Waiters, who are constantly observing this cycle, must be the most disillusioned of men.

It is in the capacity to love, that is to SEE, that the liberation of the soul from fantasy consists. The freedom which is a proper human goal is the freedom from fantasy, that is the realism of compassion. What I have called fantasy, the proliferation of blinding self-centered aims and images, is itself a powerful system of energy, and most of what is often called 'will' or 'willing' belongs to this system. What counteracts the system is attention to reality inspired by, consisting of, love.

Coffee, unless it is very good and made by somebody else, is pretty intolerable at any time.

He was a sociologist; he had got into an intellectual muddle early on in life and never managed to get out.

Of course reading and thinking are important but, my God, food is important too.

evil soon makes tools out of those who don't hate it.