“Saints are those who managed to love more than we did.”

“Combat is fear and management of fear far more than it is organized murder. Those who manage fear best will seize the day.”

“Love, after all, always said more about those who felt it than it did about the ones they loved.”

“We probably have a greater love for those we support than for those who support us. Our vanity carries more weight than our self-interest.”

“He had thought love as a policy made a lot of sense for those who could manage it, and anyone who could manage it belonged in religious life. The rest of us have to struggle with more ordinary love, the common or garden variety: love as a crippling condition. Love as a syndrome.”

“It was a true conversation. About whether our ancestors had more important lives than we do. And how they've managed to trick us, if they did not.”