“All times are beautiful for those who maintain joy within them; but there is no happy or favorable time for those with disconsolate or orphaned souls.”
“I see my path, but I don’t know where it leads. Not knowing where I am going is what inspires me to travel it.”
“I will not speak of him as if he were absent, he has not been and he will never be. These are not mere words of consolation. Only those of us who feel it truly and permanently in the depths of our souls can comprehend this. Physical life is ephemeral, it passes inexorably... This truth should be taught to every human being -- that the immortal values of the spirit are above physical life. What sense does life have without these values? What then is it to live? Those who understand this and generously sacrifice their physical life for the sake of good and justice -- how can they die? God is the supreme idea of goodness and justice.”
“God's favor floats as it were over all this and finds joy in turning all those miseries to the greater profit of those who love Him. From toil He makes patience spring forth.”
“Fish held the silence for so long that I had to restrain myself from prodding her. That's never a good idea. Sometimes people hesitate because they don't have the courage to come out with whatever needs to be said; other times they desperately want to speak but can't find the words. Jabbing them prematurely tends to shut them up. Outwaiting them gives them the time to say more than they intend.”
“The person who expects to understand history must submerge himself in it, must get rid of patriotism, as well as bitterness. And especially in studying a historic life that consists in insecurity must the historian rid himself of all insecurity. He must accept the totality of the data in all their fullness, the noble with the paltry, thinking of how the two interlock.”
“Love is an incurable disease. In love, there is permanent suffering. Those who love and those who are happy are not the same.”