“Though he had both esteem and admiration for the sensibility of the human race, he had little respect for their intelligence: man has always found it easier to sacrifice his life than to learn the multiplication table.[Mr Harrington's washing]”

“Dragon was controlling himself admirably but he had the look of a man who has found something unpleasant on his boot.”

“You differ from a great man in only one respect: the great man was once a very little man, but he developed one important quality: he recognized the smallness and narrowness of his thoughts and actions. Under the pressure of some task that meant a great deal to him, he learned to see how his smallness, his pettiness endangered his happiness. In other words, a great man knows when and in what way he is a little man. A little man does not know he is little and is afraid to know. He hides his pettiness and narrowness behind illusions of strength and greatness, someone else's strength and greatness. He's proud of his great generals but not of himself. He admires an idea he has not had, not one he has had. The less he understands something, the more firmly he believes in it. And the better he understands an idea, the less he believes in it.”

“He has achieved success who has lived well, laughed often, and loved much;Who has enjoyed the trust of pure women, the respect of intelligent men and the love of little children;Who has filled his niche and accomplished his task;Who has never lacked appreciation of Earth's beauty or failed to express it;Who has left the world better than he found it,Whether an improved poppy, a perfect poem, or a rescued soul;Who has always looked for the best in others and given them the best he had;Whose life was an inspiration;Whose memory a benediction.”

“There was once a man, Harry, called the steppenwolf. He went on two legs, wore clothes and was a human being, but nevertheless he was in reality a wolf of the steppes. He had learned a good deal of all that people of a good intelligence can, and was a fairly clever fellow. What he had not learned, however, was this: to find contentment in himself and his own life.”

“She had found Rasputin to be an odd, intense man. He had been undeniably human and very likely insane, but anyone who could survive reputedly being stabbed, poisoned, shot multiple times, mutilated, and badly beaten before finally drowning, deserved a certain amount of respect.”