On the level of investigative results, John Boswell's methodology has led to the discovery that what has been called the repression of homosexuality does not date back to Christianity properly speaking, but developed within the Christian era at a much later date. In this type of analysis it is important to be aware of the way in which people conceived of their own sexuality.

In civilizations without boats, dreams dry up, espionage takes the place of adventure and the police take the place of pirates.

People can tolerate two homosexuals they see leaving together, but the next day they're smiling, holding hands, tenderly embracing one another, then they cannot be forgiven. It is not the departure for pleasure that is unacceptable, it is waking up happy.

In its function, the power to punish is not essentially different from that of curing or educating.

From the idea that the self is not given to us, I think there is only one practical consequence: we have to create ourselves as a work of art.

We must escape and help others to escape the two readymade formulas of the pure sexual encounter and the lovers' fusion of identities.

If I open a book and see that the author is accusing an adversary of "infantile leftism" I shut it again right away. That's not my way of doing things; I don't belong to the world of people who do things that way. I insist on this difference as something essential: a whole morality is at stake; the one that concerns the search for truth and the relation to the other.