“..still to have loved her without return would have lifted you higher than all those, be they who they may, that have ever known her to love.”

“I would rather be a cripple and have your love for all of a single moment than to live as I am without ever having it.”

“Hunger of the body is altogether different from the shallow, daily hunger of the belly. Those who have known this kind of hunger cannot entirely love, ever again, those who have not.”

“Need-love says of a woman, "I cannot live without her"; Gift-love longs to give her happiness, comfort, protection...appreciative love gazes and holds its breath and is silent, rejoices that such a wonder should exist even if not for him, will not be wholly dejected by losing her, would rather have it so than never to have seen her at all.”

“Who would have known kissing someone you love was so much better than kissing other girls?”

“Curious,' the Prince continued, after a deep silence, 'is it possible never to have known something, never to have missed it in its absence -- and a few moments later to live in and for that single experience alone? Can a single moment make a man so different from himself? It would be just as impossible for me to return to the joys and wishes of yesterday morning as it would for me to return to the games of childhood, now that I have seen that object, now that her image dwells here -- and I have this living, overpowering feeling within me: from now on you can love nothing other than her, and in this world nothing else will ever have any effect on you.”