The discovery of America was the occasion of the greatest outburst of cruelty and reckless greed known in history.

It is when we try to grapple with another man's intimate need that we perceive how incomprehensible, wavering and misty are the beings that share with us the sight of the stars and the warmth of the sun. It is as if loneliness were a hard and absolute condition of existence; the envelope of flesh and blood on which our eyes are fixed melts before the outstretched hand, and there remains only the capricious, unconsolable and elusive spirit that no eye can follow, no hand can grasp.

Action is consolatory. It is the enemy of thought and the friend of flattering illusions.

When one has got to make correct entries, one comes to hate those savages--hate them to the death.

In order to move others deeply we must deliberately allow ourselves to be carried away beyond the bounds of our normal sensibility.

They had behind them, to my mind, the terrific suggestiveness of words heard in dreams, of phrases spoken in nightmares.

I have a voice, too, and for good or evil mine is the speech that cannot be silenced