I'm beginning to think that maybe everything that happens makes sense. Like, if it didn't make sense, how could it happen?

It seems to me that one ought to rejoice in the fact of death-- ought to decide, indeed, to earn one's death by confronting with passion the conundrum of life. One is responsible to life: It is the small beacon in that terrifying darkness from which we come and to which we shall return. One must negotiate this passage as nobly as possible, for the sake of those who are coming after us.

For, while the tale of how we suffer, and how we are delighted, and how we may triumph is never new, it always must be heard. There isn't any other tale to tell, it's the only light we've got in all this darkness.

People who believe that they are strong-willed and the masters of their destiny can only continue to believe this by becoming specialists in self-deception.

If one cannot risk oneself, then one is simply incapable of giving. And, after all, one can give freedom only by setting someone free.

People who treat other people as less than human must not be surprised when the bread they have cast on the waters comes floating back to them, poisoned.

An identity is questioned only when it is menaced, as when the mighty begin to fall, or when the wretched begin to rise, or when the stranger enters the gates, never, thereafter, to be a stranger.