Fruitless striving breeds less despair than inaction.

Self-esteem is not based on itself.

Many try to force the past to change.

Was there a little time between the invention of language and the coming of true and false?

Neat trick: to be roused to ambition and reconciled to one's mediocrity at the same time.

Literary tradition is full of lies about poverty-the jolly beggar, the poor but happy milkmaid, the wholesome diet of porridge, etc.

Nobody knows the trouble I've seen: even less, the trouble I've successfully avoided.