“The cocktail filled him with a whirling exhilaration behind which he was aware of devastating desires-to rush places in fast motors, to kiss girls, to sing, to be witty. … He perceived that he had gifts of profligacy which had been neglected. -chapter 8”

His name was George F. Babbitt, and . . . he was nimble in the calling of selling houses for more than people could afford to pay.

Damn the great executives, the men of measured merriment, damn the men with careful smiles, damn the men that run the shops, oh, damn their measured merriment.

Winter is not a season in the North Middlewest; it is an industry.

Whatever the misery, he could not regain contentment with a world which, once doubted, became absurd.

People read fiction for emotion-not information

Paris is one of the largest, and certainly it is the pleasantest, of modern American cities.

So that the thrifty and industrious have to pay for the shiftless ne’er-do-weels, then maybe, to save their lazy souls and get some iron into them, a war might be a good thing? Come on, now, tell your real middle name, Mong General!

I think perhaps we want a more conscious life. We’re tired of drudging and sleeping and dying.

She was snatched back from a dream of far countries, and found herself on Main Street.

Cure the evils of Democracy by the evils of Fascism! Funny therapeutics!

What is Love? Listen! It is the rainbow that stands out, in all its glorious many-colored hues.

Fortune has dealt with me rather too well. I have known little struggle, not much poverty, many generosities.

Indians, of course, have no “theology,” and indeed no word for the system of credulity in which the white priests arrange for God, who must be entirely bewildered by it, a series of excuses for his failures.

Under a tyranny, most friends are a liability. One quarter of them turn “reasonable” and become your enemies.

It is one of the major tragedies that nothing is more discomforting than the hearty affection of the Old Friends who never were friends.

There is no greater compliment to the Jews than the fact that the degree of their unpopularity is always the scientific measure of the cruelty and silliness of the regime under which they live.

Lucid dreaming is dreaming but you being aware that you’re doing it.

You cannot teach a person something he does not already know, you can only bring what he does know to his awareness.

If, then, my awareness of the past and future makes me less aware of the present, I must begin to wonder whether I am actually living in the real world.

Energy is what I believe all of us are. We’re just conscious awareness dancing for itself for no other reason but to stay amused.

Other people teach us who we are. Their attitudes to us are the mirror in which we learn to see ourselves, but the mirror is distorted. We are, perhaps, rather dimly aware of the immense power of our social enviornment.

My earthly parents don’t know my potential or my divine qualities. They weren’t taught how to diagnose or be aware of such things.

I have no other self than the totality of things of which I am aware.

It is important to make a child aware of the existence of a weird creature like a water spider that breathes through its backside.