Treason is very much a matter of habit, Smiley decided.

It's the oldest question of all, George. Who can spy on the spies?

During the Cold War, we lived in coded times when it wasn't easy and there were shades of grey and ambiguity.

A desk is a dangerous place from which to view the world.

The only reward for love is the experience of loving.

Let's all pretend to be someone else, and then perhaps we'll find out who we are.

I think the greatest single enemy is the misuse of information, the perversion of truth in the hands of terribly skillful people.

The cat sat on the mat is not a story. The cat sat on the other cat’s mat is a story.

I used to think it was clever to confuse comedy with tragedy. Now I wish I could distinguish them.

Blackmail is more effective than bribery.

A spy, like a writer, lives outside the mainstream population. He steals his experience through bribes and reconstructs it.

The sole sacred duty is to fear God.

When friendships are real, they are not glass threads or frost work, but the solidest things we can know.

Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard.

In this world we must help one another.

This enemy of peace in the world today is unlike any we have seen in the past, and our military is learning from, and building on, previous successes while carrying peace and freedom into the future.

To have a little recognition, that is very nice, you dig. It is good for the ego, for the psyche.

Sacrifices are not in vain. At the end, everything will pay off.

I was always much more shy. All I knew was that I loved to act. But I don't know about the other part of it. I'm not sure I had the chutzpah to go and prove yourself.

President Obama should be championing American prominence, not apologizing for it.

That bitter word, which closed all earthly friendships and finished every feast of love farewell!