I do not know if she was virtuous, but she was ugly, and with a woman that is half the battle.

If you wish to strive for peace of soul and pleasure, then believe.

Wherever they burn books they will also, in the end, burn human beings.

It must require an inordinate share of vanity and presumption, too, after enjoying so much that is good and beautiful on earth, to ask the Lord for immortality in addition to it all.

Sleep is good, death is better; but of course, the best thing would to have never been born at all.

Every man, either to his terror or consolation, has some sense of religion.

The deepest truth blooms only from the deepest love.

Money is the god of our time, and Rothschild is his prophet.

The swan, like the soul of the poet, By the dull world is ill understood.

Like a great poet, Nature produces the greatest results with the simplest means. These are simply a sun, trees, flowers, water and love.

Matrimony; the high sea for which no compass has yet been invented.

Conservative Christians take every word of the Bible literally except for the part about Loving Thy Neighbor.

I am an educated black woman in a time when educated black people will be called upon to risk everything for the rights of black people everywhere.

I had been there before

I buried Joel on our 48th anniversary. I had been with her since I was 16.

Kind words are benedictions. The are not only instruments of power, but of benevolence and courtesy; blessings both to the speaker and hearer of them.

There have been times in my life where I was asked to do things and I didn't feel comfortable with it.

I feel like every artist has an opportunity to create something new and to challenge themselves to reach out to a new crowd.

You will never be indecisive if you know your purpose.

The high intellectual value of images, however, lies in the fact that they usually, and perhaps always, fit more than one actual experience.

Calling one thing 'literature' and another 'fiction' is a way to create status where there is none.