In a temple everything should be serious except the thing that is being worshiped.

I don't recognize you - I've changed a lot.

My writing has gone to bits - like my character. I am simply a self-conscious nerve in pain.

The honest ratepayer and his healthy family have no doubt often mocked at the dome-like forehead of the philosopher, and laughed over the strange perspective of the landscape that lies beneath him. If they really knew who he was, they would tremble. For Chuang Tsǔ spent his life in preaching the great creed of Inaction, and in pointing out the uselessness of all things.

The essence of thought, as the essence of life, is growth.

Lots of people act well, but few people talk well. This shows that talking is the more difficult of the two.

Actual life was chaos, but there was something terribly logical in the imagination. It was the imagination that set remorse to dog the feet of sin. It was the imagination that made each crime bear its misshapen brood. In the common world of fact the wicked were not punished, nor the good rewarded. Success was given to the strong, failure thrust upon the weak. That was all.