... and that was when I learned that work gets done if you simply do it.

She said that her job as a writer of fiction was to report on the human condition, to tel us who we are and what we think and what we do.

This is not the story of my marriage. I cannot tell that story: I cannot take hold of, or lay out for anyone, the many swamps and grasses and pockets of fresh air and dank air that have gone over us.

I never wrote him. I never saw him again. He was just gone, this dear, dear man, this friend of my soul in the hospital so long ago, disappeared. This is a New York story too.

But early on I saw this: You are wasting time by suffering twice. I mention this only to show how many things the mind cannot will itself to do, even if it wants to.

Walking there, she said: Look, it seems like some one has kept each stone with measured precision at its place. Yes, she was right.

I believe that traditional religious belief and scientific knowledge depict the universe in radically different ways. At the bedrock they are incompatible and mutually exclusive.

I'm only rich because I know when I'm wrong...I basically have survived by recognizing my mistakes.

Between these two, the denying of sins, which we have done, and the bragging of sins, which we have not done, what a space, what a compass is there, for millions of millions of sins!

Waning moons their settled periods keep, to swell the billows and ferment the deep.

I consider myself to be a romantic person, and I love the idea of having a soul mate.

The American empire will not disappear... because America does not have an empire.

The more you meditate, the more helpful you can be to others, and the more deeply you will be in tune with God.

Most actors, unless they're big movie stars and can carve out huge chunks of time to focus on one movie that takes six months - the rest of us have to jump around to make ends meet.

I had this almost Dickensian look. I was quite fragile.