“The important thing is not the object of love, but the emotion itself.”

“The unfed mind devours itself.”

“Although Americans justify their self-interest in moral terms, their true interest is never itself moral.”

“How marvelous books are, crossing worlds and centuries, defeating ignorance and, finally, cruel time itself.”

“In fact, life itself is a contradiction if only because birth is the direct cause, in every single case, of death”

“…the American reader cannot bear a surprise. He knows that this is the greatest country on earth…and evidence to the contrary is not admissible. That means no inconvenient facts, no new information. If you really want the reader’s attention, you must flatter him. Make his prejudices your own. Tell him things he already knows. He will love your soundness.”

“No one can ever love us quite so much as we love ourselves.”