“The most dangerous enemy of the truth and freedom amongst us is the compact majority.”

I believe that, before all else, I’m a human being, no less than you.

When we dead awaken. We see that we have never lived.

There is something so indescribably sweet and satisfying in the knowledge that a husband or wife has forgiven the other freely, and from the heart.

Rob the average man of his life-illusion, and you rob him of his happiness at the same stroke.

What ought a man be? Well, my short answer is ‘himself’.

When you’ve sold yourself once for the sake of others, you don’t do it second time.

Writing has… been to me like a bath from which I have risen feeling cleaner, healthier, and freer.

Different people have different duties assigned them by Nature; Nature has given one the power or the desire to do this, the other that. Each bird must sing with his own throat.

It’s a liberation to know that an act of spontaneous courage is yet possible in this world. An act that has something of unconditional beauty.

The spectacles of experience; through them you will see more clearly a second time.

Oh courage, oh yes! If only one had that. Then life might be livable, in spite of everything.

The sea possesses a power over one’s moods that has the effect of a will. The sea can hypnotize. Nature in general can do so.

If I cannot be myself in what I write, then the whole is nothing but lies and humbug.

It is the very mark of the spirit of rebellion to crave for happiness in this life

Don’t use that foreign word: ideals. We have the excellent native word: lies.

You see, there are some people that one loves, and others that perhaps one would rather be with.

The book itself is a curious artifact, not showy in its technology but complex and extremely efficient: a really neat little device, compact, often very pleasant to look at and handle, that can last decades, even centuries.

When a man sells eleven ounces for twelve, he makes a compact with the devil, and sells himself for the value of an ounce.

Justice is a kind of compact not to harm or be harmed.

There is no such thing as justice in the abstract; it is merely a compact between men.

Like the cobra, you remain coiled in a loose but compact position and your strike should be felt before it is seen.