“Without doubt, the Lord grants all favors which are asked of Him in Mass, provided they be fitting for us.”

Every day we are changing, every day we are dying, and yet we fancy ourselves eternal.

Marriage is good for those who are afraid to sleep alone at night.

No one cares to speak to an unwilling listener. An arrow never lodges in a stone: often it recoils upon the shooter of it.

When we pray we speak to God; but when we read, God speaks to us.

When the stomach is full, it is easy to talk of fasting.

Whoever eats the Lamb outside this House is profane.

A friend is long sought, hardly found, and with difficulty kept.

Catch, then, O catch the transient hour; Improve each moment as it flies!

Being over seventy is like being engaged in a war. All our friends are going or gone and we survive amongst the dead and the dying as on a battlefield.

Malice swallows the greatest part of its own venom.

The Church of Christ has been founded by shedding its own blood, not that of others; by enduring outrage, not by inflicting it. Persecutions have made it grow; martyrdoms have crowned it.

Woman is the root of all evil.

I praise wedlock, I praise marital union, but only because they produce me virgins.

Thank God I am deemed worthy to be hated by the world.

A false interpretation of Scripture causes that the gospel of the Lord becomes the gospel of man, or, which is worse, of the devil.

Instead of speaking saintly words we must act them.

And silence sounds no worse than cheers After earth has stopped the ears.

It’s okay to doubt yourself, it’s okay to feel down; just never give up.

I think I was probably wondering, having looked at human beings for a long time, wondering if evolution ever took place. And I still have my doubts.

Servile doubt argues an impotence of mind, that says we fear because we dare not meet misfortunes.

In days of doubt, in days of dreary musings on my country’s fate, you alone are my comfort and support, oh great, powerful, righteous, and free Russian language!

I don’t know what will become of this piece. Our brave critics will no doubt charge me with imitating Ravel’s Bolero. Too bad – this is how I hear war.

Science is the outcome of being prepared to live without certainty and therefore a mark of maturity. It embraces doubt and loose ends.

The deplorable mania of doubt exhausts me. I doubt about everything, even my doubts.