“When a lack of white blood cells exposes the horizon of being, one has to make a choice. To cloister yourself away in a germ-free environment, alive but alone, or to embrace the woman you love and catch your death of cold at the marriage ceremony? What a great show. It’s inner-directed script was unmatched by any other soap opera.”

“When this life is over what will have mattered about your life is what other lives you touched, who did you love, who loved you. We show love when we walk in empathy toward others. It’s easy to have a love walk in your own culture, [but] can you show love in foreign environments or to people not of your ‘tribe’? That is our goal [and] it’s what defines and refines us”

“Character and ideals are catching. When you associate with men who aspire to the highest and best, you expose yourself to the qualities that make men great.”

“And in our dark days, with so many threatening clouds on the horizon, he concluded, we puff up a story like this to drug people, to distract theirattention from the serious problems anddivert them with a Romeo-and-Julietstory, one scripted, however, by a soap opera writer.”

“I’d think there are degrees of greatness,” Adam said.“I don’t think so,” said Samuel. “That would be like saying there is a little bigness. No. I believe when you come to that responsibility - that hugeness - you are alone to make your choice. On one side you have warmth and companionship and sweet understanding, and on the other cold, lonely greatness. There you make your choice. I’m glad I chose mediocrity, but how am I to say what reward might have come with the other?”

“Having sex with your neighbour is not a good idea. Not under any circumstances, nothing good will come of it. It’s a cliché. It’s a soap opera. It’s a bad made for TV movie.”