Patriotism is "a very definite feeling of preference for one's own people or State above all other peoples and States, and a consequent wish to get for that people or State the greatest advantages and power that can be got - things which are obtainable only at the expense of the advantages and power of other peoples or States."

People understand the meaning of eating lies in the nourishment of the body only when they cease to consider that the object of that activity is pleasure. ...People understand the meaning of art only when they cease to consider that the aim of that activity is beauty, i.e., pleasure.

In all history there is no war which was not hatched by the governments, the governments alone, independent of the interests of the people, to whom war is always pernicious even when successful.

One must be cunning and wicked in this world.

It's not so much that he can't fall in love, but he has not the weakness necessary.

Seize the moment of happiness... love and be loved.

Good fiction doesn't come out of the basic conflict of good versus bad. Instead, it comes out of a conflict between good and good.