“Who knows what true happiness is, not the conventional word.. but the naked terror. To the lonely themselves, that wears a mask, the most miserable outcast hugs some memory.. or some illusion.”

“Vanity plays lurid tricks with our memory, and the truth of every passion wants some pretence to make it live.”

“They believed their words. Everybody shows a respectful deference to certain sounds that he and his fellows can make. But about feelings people really know nothing. We talk with indignation or enthusiasm; we talk about oppression, cruelty, crime, devotion, self-sacrifice, virtue, and we know nothing real beyond the words. Nobody knows what suffering or sacrifice mean- except, perhaps the victims of the mysterious purpose of these illusions.”

“Some great men owe most of their greatness to the ability of detecting in those they destine for their tools the exact quality of strength that matters for their work. ”

“Life knows us not and we do not know life—-we don’t know even our own thoughts. Half the words we use have no meaning whatever and of the other half each man understands each word after the fashion of his own folly and conceit. Faith is a myth and beliefs shift like mists on the shore; thoughts vanish; words, once pronounced, die; and the memory of yesterday is as shadowy as the hope of tomorrow”

“...if it be true that every novel contains an element of autobiography—and this can hardly be denied, since the creator can only express himself in his creation—then there are some of us to whom an open display of sentiment is repugnant.”

“The word 'ivory' rang in the air, was whispered, was sighed. You would think they were praying to it. A taint of imbecile rapacity blew through it all, like a whiff from some corpse.”