The place for truth is not in the facts of a novel; it is in the feelings.

But I have noticed this about ambitious men, or men in power, that they fear even the slightest and least likely threat to it.

There are such people, unfortunates who have to be angry before they can feel alive. I had sometimes wondered if it were some old relic of pagan superstition, the fear of risking the jealousy and anger of the gods, that made such people afraid of even small happinesses. Or perhaps it was only that tragedy is more self-important than laughter.

I had always been content to know that there was more in the living world than we could hope to understand.

It seems to me you can be awfully happy in this life if you stand aside and watch and mind your own business, and let other people do as they like about damaging themselves and one another. You go on kidding yourself that you're impartial and tolerant and all that, then all of a sudden you realize you're dead, and you've never been alive at all.

Every life has a death, and every light a shadow. Be content to stand in the light, and let the shadow fall where it will.

I suppose one gets to know men quickest by the things they take for granted.