Don't force me into saying what I don't want to say, and what I won't say.

No matter how often you knock at nature's door, she won't answer in words you can understand--for Nature is dumb. She'll vibrate and moan like a violin, but you mustn't expect a song.

If we wait for the moment when everything, absolutely everything is ready, we shall never begin.

I'm through with Tolstoy. He has ceased to exist for me.... If I eat a bowl of soup and like it, I know by that fact alone and with absolute certainty that Tolstoy will find it bad, and vice versa.

A son is like a lopped off branch. As a falcon he comes when he wills and goes where he lists.

Even nightingales can’t be fed on fairy tales.

Death is like a fisherman, who, having caught a fish in his net, leaves it in the water for a time; the fish continues to swim about, but all the while the net is round it, and the fisherman will snatch it out in his own good time.