“Lucretius, who follows [Epicurus] in denouncing love, sees no harm in sexual intercourse provided it is divorced from passion.”

The first-beginnings of things cannot be distinguished by the eye.

Not they who reject the gods are profane, but those who accept them.

All things keep on in everlasting motion, Out of the infinite come the particles, Speeding above, below, in endless dance.

Fear is the mother of all gods.

Why dost thou not retire like a guest sated with the banquet of life, and with calm mind embrace, thou fool, a rest that knows no care?

Rest, brother, rest. Have you done ill or well Rest, rest, There is no God, no gods who dwell Crowned with avenging righteousness on high Nor frowning ministers of their hate in hell.

There is nothing that exists so great or marvelous that over time mankind does not admire it less and less.

The greatest wealth is to live content with little, for there is never want where the mind is satisfied.

Falling drops will at last wear away stone.

Whenever anything changes and quits its proper limits, this change is at once the death of that which was before.

From the heart of this fountain of delights wells up some bitter taste to choke them even amid the flowers.

Mother of Aeneas, pleasure of men and gods.

Our life must once have end; in vain we fly From following Fate; e’en now, e’en now, we die.

Deprived of pain, and also deprived of danger, able to do what it wants, [Nature] does not need us, nor understands our deserts, and it cannot be angry.

Do we not see all humans unaware Of what they want, and always searching everywhere, And changing place, as if to drop the load they bear?

Those things that are in the light we behold from darkness.

There exists a meaning, hidden from day to day, but accessible in moments of greatest attentiveness, in those moments when consciousness loves the world.

That fear of missing out on things makes you miss out on everything.

If only Jesus’ followers shared his personality. That one shift alone would correct so many of the ridiculous and horrifying things that pass for popular Christianity.

Churches can become places of cynicism, resistance, and pessimism.

Envy bestrides praise.

All the while, believe me, I prayed our night would last twice as long.

One of the tricks to writing great plays is to get people in a room together and not let them leave.

Jesus associated with the outcasts; he spoke with them, touched them, ate with them, loved them.