“Civilization began the first time an angry person cast a word instead of a rock.”

A woman should soften but not weaken a man.

The madman is a dreamer awake.

What progress we are making. In the Middle Ages they would have burned me. Now they are content with burning my books.

Human beings are funny. They long to be with the person they love but refuse to admit openly.

Dogs love their friends and bite their enemies, quite unlike people, who are incapable of pure love and always have to mix love and hate.

There is little that gives children greater pleasure than when a grown-up lets himself down to their level, renounces his oppressive superiority and plays with them as an equal.

All family life is organized around the most damaged person in it.

The creative writer does the same as the child at play; he creates a world of fantasy which he takes very seriously.

Religion is an illusion and it derives its strength from the fact that it falls in with our instinctual desires.

Knowledge is the intellectual manipulation of carefully verified observations.

If it’s not one thing, it’s your mother.

A strong egoism is a protection.

The meager satisfaction that man can extract from reality leaves him starving.

Being entirely honest with oneself is a good exercise.

My love is something valuable to me which I ought not to throw away without reflection.

Life, as we find it, is too hard for us; it brings us too many pains, disappointments and impossible tasks.

Great anger and violence can never build a nation.

Be angry, it’s okay. To be angry, that is very human. And to learn how to smile at your anger and make peace with your anger is very nice.

When angry, count four. When very angry, swear.

You can tell the greatness of a man by what makes him angry.

Go, and never darken my towels again.

Anger is better. There is a sense of being in anger. A reality and presence. An awareness of worth. It is a lovely surging.

There are two things a person should never be angry at, what they can help, and what they cannot.

The way to change others’ minds is with affection, and not anger.