The preoccupation with what should be is estimable only when the respect for what is has been exhausted.

Rancor is an outpouring of a feeling of inferiority.

We need to study the whole of history, not to fall back into it, but to see if we can escape from it.

The type of human being we prefer reveals the contours of our heart.

Effort is only effort when it begins to hurt.

Tell me to what you pay attention and I will tell you who you are.

Life is a series of collisions with the future.

I am I plus my surroundings; and if I do not preserve the latter, I do not preserve myself.

An 'unemployed' existence is a worse negation of life than death itself.

To wonder is to begin to understand.

We distinguish the excellent man from the common man by saying that the former is the one who makes great demands on himself, and the latter who makes no demands on himself.

My mouth was dry. Whispers carried on the wind as the maids around me bunched together in small groups, hysterical, morbid. I thought: who will clean the mess?

Wanting to work is so rare a merit, that it should be encouraged.

Education is not received. It is achieved.

When it comes to making decisions, I will come down on the side of Nebraska every time. If I have to choose between the White House and the farmhouse, I choose the farmhouse.

America's image throughout the world is very bad.

Y'know, we're all wasting our time writing this hack science fiction! You wanta make real money, you gotta start a religion!

The rarest attainment is to grow old happily and gracefully.

Don't ever confuse motion with progress.

The president has the authority to end this dragnet surveillance immediately

I write the books I want to read. I'm interested in seeing what happens with this book in the marketplace.