Violence is its own anesthetist. The numbness it induces feels very much like calm.

Porches are America's lost rooms.

The most painful moral struggles are not those between good and evil, but between the good and the lesser good.

There are no original ideas. There are only original people.

Fantasies are more than substitutes for unpleasant reality; they are also dress rehearsals, plans. All acts performed in the world begin in the imagination.

Our awesome responsibility to ourselves, to our children, and to the future is to create ourselves in the image of goodness, because the future depends on the nobility of our imaginings.

There is no way to take the danger out of human relationships.

All acts performed in the world begin in the imagination.

To sleep is an act of faith.

Persecution always acts as a jell for members of cults; it proves to them, in the absence of history, liturgy, tradition, and doctrine, that they are God's chosen.

Food is my drug of choice.

Actually, I am a coward. I say only what is safe to say, and I criticise only what is permissable to criticise.

I believe that it was a testament to the change of power from the company to the fans because the more the fans ate it up, the more the company gave them what they want.

Your flesh is killing your spirit. You have forsaken yourself.

At night, when the curtains are drawn and the fire flickers, my books attain a collective dignity.

THE BAD THING ABOUT FEAR Is it requires a reaction. Some hide. Some cry. But, like a dog condemned to a walled yard with no hope of escape or affection, some learn to bite.

If you can write a nation's stories, you needn't worry about who makes its laws. Today, television tells most of the stories to most of the people most of the time.

Do not let the past disturb you, just leave everything in the Sacred Heart and begin again with joy.

Friendship is not linear. It moves in all directions, teaching us about ourselves and about each other.

Ultimately, the best strategy to ensure our security and to build a durable peace is to support the advance of democracy elsewhere. Democracies don't attack each other.