“I keep the bible in a pool of blood so that none of its lies can affect me.”

“The look in her eyes told me that under any other circumstances, I would either already be naked with her on top of me, or lying in a pool of my own blood on the rug.”

“It's not the things I don't understand about the Bible that bother me; it's the things I understand with perfect clarity and don't comply with that keep me up at night.”

“It's good for me to see so many other people who are not me. That there are so many others. I feel affection for them. Most of them are doing the best they can. I am also doing the best I can.”

“I exist. It's sweet, so sweet, so slow. And light: you'd think it floated all by itself. It stirs. It brushes by me, melts and vanishes. Gently, gently. There is bubbling water in my throat, it caresses me- and now it comes up again into my mouth. For ever I shall have a little pool of whitish water in my mouth - lying low - grazing my tongue. And this pool is still me. And the tongue. And the throat is me.”

“The fact is that our Union rests upon public opinion and can never be cemented by the blood of its citizens...If it can not live in the affections of its people, it must die.”