“There is no better way to understand your own motives and dispositions than by finding someone to act as your opposite.”

“The coded message is a lifeless thing, mummified and entombed. To the would-be cryptologist we must offer the same advice we would give the grave-robber, the spelunker, and the sorcerer of legend: beware what you dig up; it is yours.”

“She was beautiful, in the quiet way that lonely, unnoticed people are beautiful to those who notice them.”

“All the world's a rube, and he who tries to prove otherwise will be the first to wake onstage, victim of our just ridicule.”

“Love is the same as being lost,' says Jacques to the dark. 'Except you don't care that you're lost.”

“The world is unkind to the shoeless and frolicsome.”

“Woe to he who checkmates his opponents at last, only to discover they have been playing cribbage.”