And this I believe: that the free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world. And this I would fight for: the freedom of the mind to take any direction it wishes, undirected. And this I must fight against: any idea, religion, or government which limits or destroys the individual. This is what I am and what I am about.

If we could learn even a little to like ourselves, maybe our cruelties and angers might melt away.

Every man in a bank hates what the bank does and yet the bank does it.

I believe that there is one story in the world, and only one. . . . Humans are caught—in their lives, in their thoughts, in their hungers and ambitions, in their avarice and cruelty, and in their kindness and generosity too—in a net of good and evil. . . . There is no other story. A man, after he has brushed off the dust and chips of his life, will have left only the hard, clean questions: Was it good or was it evil? Have I done well—or ill?

It’s a hard thing to leave any deeply routine life, even if you hate it.

Anything that just costs money is cheap.

Ideas are like rabbits. You get a couple and learn how to handle them, and pretty soon you have a dozen.