“- even in the midst of grief the mind grapples with a hundred impressions: a pain below the heart, an odor on the breeze.”

“Life is from zero to one, sorrow to pain and love to happiness, passing all along with smile on face despite grief and unhappiness, deep below lies the quenching heart, which is flowing with energy and bloody rain.”

“Grenouille’s mother, however, perceived the odor neither of the fish nor of the corpses, for her sense of smell had been utterly dulled, besides which her belly hurt, and the pain deadened all susceptibility of sensate impressions.”

“Even when in the midst of disturbance, the stillness of the mind can offer sanctuary.”

“Smell is a potent wizard that transports you across thousands of miles and all the years you have lived. The odors of fruits waft me to my southern home, to my childhood frolics in the peach orchard. Other odors, instantaneous and fleeting, cause my heart to dilate joyously or contract with remembered grief. Even as I think of smells, my nose is full of scents that start awake sweet memories of summers gone and ripening fields far away.”

“Closing down in the midst of pain is a denial of a man's true nature. A superior man is free in feeling and action, evenamidst great pain and hurt. If necessary, a man should live with a hurting heart rather than a closed one. He shouldlearn to stay in the wound of pain and act with spontaneous skill and love even from that place.”