True education flowers at the point when delight falls in love with responsibility.

What I couldn't help noticing was that I learned more about the novel in a morning by trying to write a page of one than I'd learned in seven years or so of trying to write criticism

Being in love was like China: you knew it was there, and no doubt it was very interesting, and some people went there, but I never would.

Lee saw the fireball and head through the roar in his ears Hester saying, "That's the last of 'em Lee." He said, or thought, "Those poor men didn't have to come to this, nor did we." She said, "We held 'em off. We held out. We're a-helping Lyra." Then she was pressing her little proud broken self against his face, as close as she could get, and then they died.

Symbols and emblems were everywhere. Buildings and pictures were designed to be read like books. Everything stood for something else; if you had the right dictionary, you could read Nature itself. It was hardly surprising to find philosophers using the symbolism of their time to interpret knowledge that came from a mysterious source.

All good things pass away.

All stories teach, whether the storyteller intends them to or not. They teach the world we create. They teach the morality we live by. They teach it much more effectively than moral precepts and instructions.