Why did people assume that the beautiful among them needed nothing but their beauty to bring them happiness? That behind the beauty there was nothing but an empty shell, insensitive shell?

I prefer to believe the opposite - that there is always an indestructible beauty at the heart of darkness.

Suddenly, and for the first time, he was at the center of his own life, living it and loving it.

The ugliness at the heart of beauty. Is there always ugliness, do you suppose? Even when the object is very, very beautiful?

He had always felt that he lived on the edges of life, Constantine realized, watching everyone else living, sometimes helping them do it.

Always guarding one's real, precious self in a cocoon of tranquility within a thousand masks.Life itself had become a secret affair.

Life is how you brew it. Wake up, you have a story to tell. Don't chase vain glory, your story will tell it. You owe it to yourself to write the lines of your story in the ink of purpose!

I wanted to be a teacher.

With wine, poetry, or virtue as you choose. But get drunk.

Learn to deal with the valleys and the hills will take care of themselves.

I think graphic novels are closer to prose than film, which is a really different form.

cookbooks, I found, are intended for people with time to cook - and, surprisingly often, for people who already know how to cook.

Reward the behavior you want repeated.

There is nothing man will not attempt when great enterprises hold out the promise of great rewards.

Believe me when I say that Bill Clinton's second term will be good for business. My business.

you are not too old and it is not too late to dive into your increasing depths where life calmly gives out it's own secret