“We can offer women what they want most of all, cures for the most common ailments of this world... When children are ailing or babies refuse to be born, when men are unfaithful, when the sky is empty of rain, when the amulets buried beneath holy wall upon instructions of the minim offer not solace and all entreaties to the priests for guidance fail, when the rituals they offer bring no comfort and no consolation, they come to us.”

“Based on her experience with men, most assumed that when you talked to them about a problem or dilemma, they were expected to offer an opinion, even when all you wants was for them to listen.”

“Neither refuse to give help when it is needed,... nor refuse to accept it when it is offered.”

“Many religions now come before us with ingratiating smirks and outspread hands, like an unctuous merchant in a bazaar. They offer consolation and solidarity and uplift, competing as they do in a marketplace. But we have a right to remember how barbarically they behaved when they were strong and were making an offer that people could not refuse.”

“. . . the literature of imaginatiion, even when tragic, is reassuring, not necessarily in the sense of offering nostalgic comfort, but because it offers a world large enough to contain alternatives and therefore offers hope.”

“When you really have something to offer to the world, then you can become truly humble. A tree when it has no fruit to offer, remains erect. But when the tree is laden with fruit, it bends down. If you are all pride and ego, then nobody will be able to get anything worthwhile from you. When you have genuine humility, it is a sign that you have something to offer to mankind.”