We were too intelligent, too cynical for war. Of course, you don't have to be stupid and primitive to die a stupid, primitive death.

To know a man's library is, in some measure, to know a man's mind.

A book is more than the sum of its materials. It is an artifact of the human mind and hand.

There are always a few who stand up in times of communal madness and have the courage to say that what unites us is greater than what divides us.

She was like a butterfly, full of color and vibrancy when she chose to open her wings, yet hardly visible when she closed them.

I'm a praying atheist. When I hear an ambulance siren, I ask for a blessing for those people in trouble, knowing that no one's listening. I think it's just a habit of mindfulness.

The brave man, the real hero, quakes with terror, sweats, feels his very bowels betray him, and in spite of this moves forward to do the act he dreads.

It is human nature to imagine, to put yourself in another's shoes. The past may be another country. But the only passport required is empathy.

Book burnings. Always the forerunners. Heralds of the stake, the ovens, the mass graves.

Who is the brave man--he who feels no fear? If so, then bravery is but a polite term for a mind devoid of rationality and imagination.

You go on. You set one foot in front of the other, and if a thin voice cries out, somewhere behind you, you pretend not to hear, and keep going.

Dream while others are sleeping. Dare while others are wishing. Do while others are talking. Deliver while others are quitting.

I hate beyond hate.

But the real secret to lifelong good health is actually the opposite: Let your body take care of you.

My father, he was like the rock, the guy you went to with every problem.

God is good and I am always loved.

One of the things that writers worry about is finding a voice. I don't think it's a thing that you find so much as it is something that comes to you, or that presents itself.

Since I'm constantly in the sun, I use sunscreen daily.

I guess a normal woman would find it extremely enjoyable to wear fancy clothes. For me, I didn't enjoy it. It felt like a straight jacket.

The shift in the world begins with a shift in our thinking. Shifting our thinking does not change the world, but it creates a condition where the shift in the world becomes possible.

I am afraid that we are beginning to be over-educated; at least everybody who is incapable of learning has taken to teaching -that is really what our enthusiasm for education has come to.