Life itself, however, flows and is sequential and punishes those who try to compartmentalize it. Thus if, for any reason whatsoever, moral standards are conspicuously and unprecedentedly breached in one area of society, such as the political, it will follow as the night the day that those standards will start collapsing all down the line-in sports, entertainment, education, the armed forces, business and government.

the conversation whipped gaily around the table like rags in a high wind.

it is a waste of time to ask more of people than they have to give.

in race relations, the single gesture and the single individual are more often than not doomed to failure. Only the group and the long-term, undeviating policy make much headway. ... if you want to make the world a better place, the first thing you must accept is the fact that you cannot transcend your limitations as an individual.

The great disadvantage of being in a rat race is that it is humiliating. The competitors in a rat race are by definition rodents.

The important thing about human beings is not what they do, but why they do it.

I was so embarrassed I could feel my nerves curling like bacon over a hot fire.