Even when we fancy we have grown wiser, it is only, it may be, that new prejudices have displaced old ones.

False friends are like our shadow, keeping close to us while we walk in the sunshine, but leaving us the instant we cross into the shade.

Doubt whom you will, but never yourself.

Our first and last love is self-love.

The scope of an intellect is not to be measured with a tape-string, or a character deciphered from the shape or length of a nose.

It is the passion that is in a kiss that gives to it its sweetness; it is the affection in a kiss that sanctifies it.

We fear things in proportion to our ignorance of them.

The opinions of the misanthropical rest upon this very partial basis, that they adopt the bad faith of a few as evidence of the worthlessness of all.

The lively and mercurial are as open books, with the leaves turned down at the notable passages. Their souls sit at the windows of their eyes, seeing and to be seen.

Tears are nature's lotion for the eyes. The eyes see better for being washed by them.

The passions are like fire, useful in a thousand ways and dangerous only in one, through their excess.

Kei: Is there anything else you need while I'm here, Your Highness?Cabot: No, but you can leave the sarcasm in there.

What I don't write is as important as what I write.

Every single immigrant is part of a larger history that needs to be communicated in all its ambivalences and complexities.

I don't think President Bush is doing anything at all about Aids. In fact, I'm not sure he even knows how to spell Aids.

In real life, unlike in Shakespeare, the sweetness of the rose depends upon the name it bears. Things are not only what they are. They are, in very important respects, what they seem to be.

I am deeply romantic and a genuine yet complex person.

I couldn't imagine, you know, God having a plan for my life. I thought I planned my life out.

Marriage is worse than dying. Why stay with one person for fifty years? We advise against marriage.

I am always reading immoral books on the sly, and then selfishly trying to prevent other people from having the same wicked good time.

Give thanks for sorrow that teaches you pity; for pain that teaches you courage.