How many people does each of us know who claim to seek happiness but freely choose paths inevitably leading to misery?

The loss of the religious understanding of the human condition—that Man is a fallen creature for whom virtue is necessary but never fully attainable—is a loss, not a gain, in true sophistication. The secular substitute—the belief in the perfection of life on earth by the endless extension of a choice of pleasures—is not merely callow by comparison but much less realistic in its understanding of human nature.

Feeling good about yourself is not the same thing as doing good. Good policy is more important than good feelings.

There is something deeply attractive, at least to quite a lot of people, about squalor, misery, and vice. They are regarded as more authentic, and certainly more exciting, than cleanliness, happiness, and virtue.

There is nothing that an intellectual less likes to change than his mind, or a politician his policy.

Equality of Ugliness: If we can't all live in a beautiful place we must all live in an ugly place.

There is nothing an addict likes more, or that serves as better pretext for continuing his present way of life, than to place the weight of responsibility for his situation somewhere other than on his own decisions.