One faces the future with one's past.

He saw on the paper a picture of a man, white-skinned, who hung upon a crosspiece of wood. The man was without clothes except for a bit about his loins, and to all appearences he was dead, since his head drooped upon his shoulder and his eyes were closed above his bearded lips. Wang Lung looked at the pictured man in horror and with increasing interest.

Life is the wonder with which we are all infused.

Nothing and no one can destroy the Chinese people. They are relentless survivors. They are the oldest civilized people on earth. Their civilization passes through phases but its basic characteristics remain the same. They yield, they bend to the wind, but they never break.

Religion was their meat and their excitement, their mental food and their emotional pleasure.

Men and women should own the world as a mutual possession.

To serve is beautiful, but only if it is done with joy and a whole heart and a free mind.