I wonder if childhood is ever really happy. Just as well, perhaps. To be blissfully happy so young would leave one always seeking to recapture the unobtainable. Like those people who were always happiest at school or university. Always going back. No reunion ever missed. It always seemed to me rather pathetic.

History, which interprets the past to understand the present and confront the future is the least rewarding discipline for a dying species.

If all power corrupts, then a doctor, who literally holds life and death in his hands, must be at particular risk.

But what do you believe? I don't just mean religion. What are you sure of?" "That once I was not and that now I am. That one day I shall no longer be.

Human kindness is like a defective tap, the first gush may be impressive but the stream soon dries up.

Charm is always genuine; it may be superficial but it isn't false.

No literary form is more revealing, more spontaneous or more individual than a letter.