We can't forever be spending our lives paying for political follies that never gave us anything but always took from us, and I amcontent with the narrowest metes and bounds provided I have peace and quiet for work.

No guilt is forgotten so long as the conscience still knows of it.

Heroic ages are not and never were sentimental and those daring conquistadores who conquered entire worlds for their Spain or Portugal received lamentably little thanks from their kings.

How terrible this darkness was, how bewildering, and yet mysteriously beautiful!

(Brazil:) I've never beheld such a paradise. The people are enchanting and--a mercy on this earth of ours--this is the only placewhere there isn't any race question. Negroes and whites and Indians, three-quarters, oneeighth, the wonderful Mulatto and Creole women, Jews and Christians, all dwell together in a peace that passes describing. The Jewish immigrants are in seventh heaven; all of them have jobs and feel at home.

Besides, isn't it confoundedly easy to think you're a great man if you aren't burdened with the slightest idea that Rembrandt, Beethoven, Dante or Napoleon ever lived?

When it looks at great accomplishments, the world, bent on simplifying its images, likes best to look at the dramatic, picturesquemoments experienced by its heroes.... But the no less creative years of preparation remain in the shadow.