I experience religious dread whenever I find myself thinking that I know the limits of God’s grace, since I am utterly certain it exceeds any imagination a human being might have of it. God does, after all, so love the world.

For me writing has always felt like praying even when I wasn't writing prayers.

To recognize our bias toward error should teach us modesty and reflection, and to forgive it should help us avoid the inhumanity of thinking we ourselves are not as fallible as those who, in any instance, seem most at fault. Science can give us knowledge, but it cannot give us wisdom. Nor can religion, until it puts aside nonsense and distraction and becomes itself again.

I had been reading about [John] Calvin for years and had been studying the English Renaissance for many more years, and it had never occurred to me to think of them together. I learned that Calvin was the most widely read writer in England in Shakespeare's lifetime. He was translated and published in many editions.

It is one of the best traits of good people that they love where they pity. And this is truer of women than of men.

You build your mind, so make it into something you want to live with.

Rejoice with those who rejoice." I have found that difficult too often. I was much better at weeping with those who weep.