Morals are not the important thing-nor enlightenment-nor civilization. A man can do absolutely well without them, but he can't do without something to eat. The supremest thing is the need of the body, not of the mind and spirit.

A marriage...makes of two fractional lives a whole; it gives to two purposeless lives a work, and doubles the strength of each to perform it; it gives to two questioning natures a reason for living, and something to live for; it will give a new gladness to the sunshine, a new fragrance to the flowers, a new beauty to the earth, and a new mystery to life.

More than two hundred death penalties are gone from the law books, but the [biblical] texts that authorised them remain.

I do not like work even when someone else is doing it.

I am an anti-imperialist. I am opposed to having the eagle put its talons on any other land.

...the circumstances and the atmosphere always have so much to do in directing a conversation, especially a German conversation, which is only a kind of an insurrection, anyway.

Every year you wait, long ago gets farther away.