If you're paying attention to your wardrobe, Rudy believed, your mind isn't sufficiently occupied.

Show me what a people admire, and I will tell you everything about them that matters.

Of course, they (i. e., demons) had always been observed with some regularity, but that could usually be ascribed to an overabundance of piety or wine or imagination. Take your pick.

There is nothing that overwhelms the senses quite like an unwelcome silence.

If you're right, and nobody really cares what's out there, I wonder whether we're even worth saving.

So we have progressed to the point where we can move politicians around faster than light. I'm not sure I see the advantage.

An optimist is somebody who thinks our various political and social systems, schools and churches, support groups and Boy Scout troops, jury trials and congressional committees, are on the up-and-up. That they are intended for the benefit of the members. The reality is that they are designed to keep everyone in line.