“Culture primarily witnesses the absence of meaning, not it's presence.”

“It is a grave disservice to the heart, soul, body and spirit of a woman when she is given the subtle message that the truth of her own pain is not as important as the reputation of the ones who inflict it.”

“Yet Clare's love was doubtless ethereal to a fault, imaginative to impracticability. With these natures, corporeal presence is sometimes less appealing than corporeal absence; the latter creating an ideal presence that conveniently drops the defects of the real.”

“I was court-martialed in my absence, and sentenced to death in my absence, so I said they could shoot me in my absence.”

“The greatest service which can be rendered any country is to add a useful plant to its culture.--The Fruit Hunters”

“Our country is now taking so steady a course as to show by what road it will pass to destruction, to wit: by consolidation of power first, and then corruption, its necessary consequence.”

“Peace is not the absence of conflict, but the ability to cope with it.”