“ Forgiveness requires a sense that bad behaviour is a sign of suffering rather than malice. Alain de Botton
“ Insofar as we appreciate order, it is when we perceive it as being accompanied by complexity, when we feel that a variety of elements has been brought to order--that windows, doors and other details h… Alain de Botton
“ There are books that speak to us of our own lives with a clarity we cannot match. They prevent the morose suspicion that we do not fully belong to the species, that we lie beyond comprehension. Our em… Alain de Botton
“ Paying tax should be framed as a glorious civic duty worthy of gratitude - not a punishment for making money. Alain de Botton
“ Feeling lost, crazy and desperate belongs to a good life as much as optimism, certainty and reason. Alain de Botton
“ You have to be quite heavily invested in someone to do them the honour of telling them you're annoyed with them. Alain de Botton
“ At the top of the slope on the perimeter of the site, overlooking six lanes of motorway, is a diner frequented by lorry drivers who have either just unloaded or or are waiting to pick up their cargo.… Alain de Botton
“ Our exertions generally find no enduring physical correlatives. We are diluted in gigantic intangible collective projects, which leave us wondering what we did last year and, more profoundly, where we… Alain de Botton
“ Humboldt's early biographer, F.A. Schwarzenberg, subtitled his life of Humboldt What May Be Accomplished in a Lifetime. He summarised the areas of his subject's extraordinary curiosity as follows: '1)… Alain de Botton
“ Anyone who isn't embarrassed of who they were last year probably isn't learning enough. Alain de Botton
“ Though it may feel otherwise, enjoying life is no more dangerous than apprehending it with continuous anxiety and gloom. Alain de Botton
“ After Carol had left, as Symons threw away a pile of used tissues and rearranged the cushions on the couch, he remarked that the most common and unhelpful illusion plaguing those who came to see him [… Alain de Botton
“ Importance of the random: keep brushing up against people, books, experiences we don't yet know what to do with. Alain de Botton
“ But the answer isn't just to intimidate people into consuming more 'serious' news; it is to push so-called serious outlets into learning to present important information in ways that can properly enga… Alain de Botton
“ [L]ife is a phenomenon in need of criticism, for we are, as fallen creatures, in permanent danger of worshipping false gods, of failing to understand ourselves and misinterpreting the behaviour of oth… Alain de Botton
“ Blessed with riches and possibilities far beyond anything imagined by ancestors who tilled the unpredictable soil of medieval Europe, modern populations have nonetheless shown a remarkable capacity to… Alain de Botton
“ What kills us isn't one big thing, but thousands of tiny obligations we can't turn down for fear of disappointing others. Alain de Botton
“ Most of what makes a book 'good' is that we are reading it at the right moment for us. Alain de Botton
