But neither infinite power nor infinite wisdom could bestow godhood upon men. For that there would have to be infinite love as well.

For no change comes calmly over the world.

Ask for an omen, then stone it when it comes -- de essentia hominum.

Bless me Father, I ate a lizard.

One should be embarrassed to speak of God in the third person.

Listen, are we helpless? Are we doomed to do it again and again and again? Have we no choice but to play the Phoenix in an unending sequence of rise and fall? Assyria, Babylon, Egypt, Greece, Carthage, Rome, the Empires of Charlemagne and the Turk: Ground to dust and plowed with salt. Spain, France, Britain, America—burned into the oblivion of the centuries. And again and again and again. Are we doomed to it, Lord, chained to the pendulum of our own mad clockwork, helpless to halt its swing? This time, it will swing us clean to oblivion.

The trouble with being a priest was that you eventually had to take the advice you gave to others.