“Let yourself go. Pull out from the depths those thoughts that you do not understand, and spread them out in the sunlight and know the meaning of them.”

People have their own deaths as well as their own lives, and even if there is nothing beyond death, we shall differ in our nothingness.

The other damned saw what was happening and caught hold of it too. She was indignant and cried, “Let go-it’s my onion,” and as soon as she said, “my onion,” the stalk broke and she fell back into the flames.

Aziz winked at him slowly and said: “…There are many ways of being a man; mine is to express what is deepest in my heart.

She stopped and leant her elbows against the parapet of the embankment. He did likewise. There is at times a magic in identity of position; it is one of the things that have suggested to us eternal comradeship.

It was pleasant, too, to fling wide the windows, pinching the fingers in unfamiliar fastenings, to lean out into sunshine with beautiful hills and trees and marble churches opposite, and, close below, Arno, gurgling against the embankment of the road.

One must be fond of people and trust them if one is not to make a mess of life.

There are moments when the inner life actually ‘pays,’ when years of self-scrutiny, conducted for no ulterior motive, are suddenly of practical use.

Books have to be read it is the only way of discovering what they contain.

One of the evils of money is that it tempts us to look at it rather than at the things that it buys.

My temple stands not upon Mount Moriah but in the Elysian Field where even the immoral are admitted. My motto is ‘Lord, I disbelieve – help thou my unbelief.

You confuse what’s important with what’s impressive.

One always tends to overpraise a long book, because one has got through it.

The kingdom of music is not the kingdom of this world.

We cast a shadow on something wherever we stand.

Inside its cocoon of work or social obligation, the human spirit slumbers for the most part, registering the distinction between pleasure and pain, but not nearly as alert as we pretend.

One person with passion is better than forty people merely interested.

I let a tarantula walk across my hand, and I ate rat soup.

We might just as well let the rest of it go, join the party, and dance our hearts out.

You know, he’s a little bit sometimes outside the box, but you’ve got to let him be who he is.

Let us say in passing that since (philosophical) remedies are often worse than the malady, our age.

let us call it thus, is considered to be archaic or old-fashioned, as though in a way there existed no other definition of what it means to be modern than.

What if I changed my response to it? What if I decided to stop letting it bother me?

Romantic love can be a lot of crap, though, let me tell you. And it can hurt you.

You don’t have to try to impress your kids. If they’re not getting what they need from you, they will let you know.