“Stars and blossoming fruit-trees: utter permanence and extreme fragility give an equal sense of eternity.”

Everything which originates from pure love is lit with the radiance of beauty.

In struggling against anguish one never produces serenity; the struggle against anguish only produces new forms of anguish.

It is not through the way in which someone speaks about God that I can see whether that person has passed through the crucible of Divine Love, but through the way the person speaks to me about things here on earth.

Everything beautiful has a mark of eternity.

We only possess what we renounce; what we do not renounce escapes from us.

Power is the supreme end for all those who have not understood.

Human existence is so fragile a thing and exposed to such dangers that I cannot love without trembling.

What a country calls its vital economic interests are not the things which enable its citizens to live, but the things which enable it to make war. Petrol is more likely than wheat to be a cause of international conflict.

It is grace that forms the void inside us and it is grace that can fill the void.

We are like plants which have the one choice of being in or out of the light.

Imagination and fiction make up more than three quarters of our real life.

Art is the symbol of the two noblest human efforts: to construct and to refrain from destruction.

Patriotism is idolatry of the self.

Every being cries out in silence to be read differently. Do not be indifferent to these cries.

Modern life is given over to immoderation. Immoderation invades everything: actions and thought, public and private life.

To be always relevant, you have to say things which are eternal.