“Self-control might be as passionate and as active as the surrender to passion...”

“He was always seeking for a meaning in life, and here it seemed to him that a meaning was offered; but it was obscure and vague . . . He saw what looked like the truth as by flashes of lightening on a dark, stormy night you might see a mountain range. He seemed to see that a man need not leave his life to chance, but that his will was powerful; he seemed to see that self-control might be as passionate and as active as the surrender to passion; he seemed to see that the inward life might be as manifold, as varied, as rich with experience, as the life of one who conquered realms and explored unknown lands.”

“I only wanted to suggest to you that self-sacrifice is a passion so overwhelming that beside it even lust and hunger are trifling.”

“Unless love is passion, it's not love, but something else; and passion thrives not on satisfaction, but on impediment.”

“It might be that to surrender to happiness was to accept defeat, but it was a defeat better than many victories.”

“Passion may be false, trivial or unnatural, but, if violent enough, is not without some trace of grandeur.”

“He had not even the self-complacency that enables stupid people to accept their mediocrity with unction; he had on the contrary an engaging modesty.”