I see the main problem of my life, and indeed anybody's life, as the balancing of competitive freedoms ... a sense of mutual obligations that have to be honored, and a legal system which can be trusted to step in when that sense fails.

Journalism: an ability to meet the challenge of filling the space.

Did St. Francis preach to the birds? Whatever for? If he really liked birds he would have done better to preach to the cats.

I cannot think that espionage can be recommended as a technique for building an impressive civilization. It's a lout's game.

The delight we find in art amounts to recognition of a saving grace, to an acknowledgment that the problem of life has a solution implicit in its own nature, though not yet formulated by the intellect.

It seemed a good idea at the time.

Were it possible for us to wait for ourselves to come into the room, not many of us would find our hearts breaking into flower as we heard the door handle turn.