“I am not alone at all, I thought. I was never alone at all. And that, of course, is the message of Christmas. We are never alone. Not when the night is darkest, the wind coldest, the world seemingly most indifferent. For this is still the time God chooses.”

“At night, when I am alone, I call for you, and whenever my ache seems to be the greatest, you still seem to find a way to return to me.”

“Sin does not only still abide in us, but is still acting, still laboring to bring forth the deeds of the flesh. When sin lets us alone we may let sin alone; but as sin is never less quiet than when it seems to be the most quiet, and its waters are for the most part deep when they are still, so ought our contrivances against it be vigorous at all times and in all conditions, even where there is least suspicion.”

“Certainly the best times were when I was alone with mathematics, free of ambition and pretense, and indifferent to the world.”

“I never said, 'I want to be alone.' I only said 'I want to be let alone!' There is all the difference.”

“It is not night when I do see your face,Therefore I think I am not in the night;Nor doth this wood lack worlds of company,For you in my respect are all the world:Then how can it be said I am alone,When all the world is here to look on me?”