The satisfaction that accompanies good acts is itself not the motivation of the act; satisfaction is not the motive, but only the consequence.

The tongue may be employed about, and made to serve all the purposes of vice, in tempting and deceiving, in perjury and injustice.

Pain and sorrow and misery have a right to our assistance: compassion puts us in mind of the debt, and that we owe it to ourselves as well as to the distressed.

Things and actions are what they are, and the consequences of them will be what they will be: why then should we desire to be deceived?

Compassion is a call, a demand of nature, to relieve the unhappy as hunger is a natural call for food

But to us, probability is the very guide of life.

Happiness or satisfaction consists only in the enjoyment of those objects which are by nature suited to our several particular appetites, passions, and affections.

Every man is to be considered in two capacities, the private and public; as designed to pursue his own interest, and likewise to contribute to the good of others.

Love of our neighbour, then, has just the same respect to, is no more distant from, self-love, than hatred of our neighbour, or than love or hatred of anything else.

As this world was not intended to be a state of any great satisfaction or high enjoyment, so neither was it intended to be a mere scene of unhappiness and sorrow.

Happiness does not consist in self-love.

My heart is a compass, and it always leads me back to you.

You cannot slay the illusion of the victim until you face it and call it truth

Only if we transvalue the plain-vanilla standards of our life, we may bring back things to light and sense the lies behind perceptions. ("Behind the frosted glass")

In the V-shaped opening of her crape bodice Mlle. Vinteuil felt the sting of her friend's sudden kiss

Great wits are sure to madness near allied, and thin partitions do their bounds divide.

When I became my masked identity I was this incredible little nerd, but in the real world I had to be this tough kid from the neighborhood.

When I'm talking to a large audience, I imagine that I'm talking to a single person.

No efforts of mine could avail to make the book easy reading.

Whenever I do something I tend to focus on it and spend all of my time and energy on it.

I mean, like, I can go in a room and say, look, 'Watchmen' should be at least 15 minutes longer than 'Batman.' I mean, that's, like, any geek will tell you that.