There are genuine mysteries in the world that mark the limits of human knowing and thinking. Wisdom is fortified, not destroyed, by understanding its limitations. Ignorance does not make a fool as surely as self-deception.

In the case of good books, the point is not to see how many of them you can get through, but how many can get through to you.

I find the selectivity of erotic love - the choice of this man or this woman - much more intelligible if liking the person is the origin of sexual interest, rather than the other way.

The great authors were great readers, and one way to understand them is to read the books they read.

Unless we love and are loved, each of us is alone, each of us is deeply lonely.

The materialist assumption that spiritual substances do not exist is as much an act of faith as the religious belief in the reality of angels.

Love without conversation is impossible.