Misfortunes leave wounds which bleed drop by drop even in sleep; thus little by little they train man by force and dispose him to wisdom in spite of himself. Man must learn to think ofhimself as a limited and dependent being; and only suffering teaches him this.

The children of God should not have any other country here below but the universe itself, with the totality of all the reasoning creatures it ever has contained, contains, or ever will contain. That is the native city to which we owe our love.

Prayer consists simply in giving to God all the careful attention of which the soul is capable.

Imagination and fiction make up more than three quarters of our real life.

I also am other than what I imagine myself to be. To know this is forgiveness.

Sin is nothing else but the failure to recognize human wretchedness.

Every atheist is an idolater- unless he is worshipping the true God in his impersonal aspect. The majority of the pious are idolaters.