“It began to drizzle rain and he turned on the windshield wipers; they made a great clatter like two idiots clapping in church.”

“Did you see the picture of Roy Rogers's horse attending a church service in Pasadena? I forgot whether his name was Tex or Trigger but he was dressed fit to kill and looked like he was having a good time. He doubled the usual attendance.”

“He knew that he was the stuff of which fanatics and madmen are made and that he had turned his destiny as if with his bare will. He kept himself upright on a very narrow line between madness and emptiness and when the time came for him to lose his balance he intended to lurch toward emptiness and fall on the side of his choice.”

“The virtue of hope, in Enoch, was made up of two parts suspicion and one part lust.”

“Most of us come to the church by a means the church does not allow.”

“As was usual with him, he began with the least important thing and worked around and in toward the center where the meaning was.”

“He loved her because it was his nature to do so, but there were times when he could not endure her love for him. There were times when it became nothing but pure idiot mystery...”