We are told that talent creates its own opportunities. But it sometimes seems that intense desire creates not only its own opportunities but its own talents.
To believe that if only we had this or that we would be happy or to pursue any excessive desire diverts us from seeing that happiness depends on an adequate self.
The passion to get ahead is sometimes born of the fear lest we be left behind.
Faith is primarily a process of identification the process by which the individual ceases to be himself and becomes part of something eternal.
You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.
It is remarkable by how much a pinch of malice enhances the penetrating power of an idea or an opinion. Our ears, it seems, are wonderfully attuned to sneers and evil reports about our fellow men.
We are least open to precise knowledge concerning the things we are most vehement about.
Take away hatred from some people, and you have men without faith.
Faith in a holy cause is to a considerable extent a substitute for lost faith in ourselves.
Passionate hatred can give meaning and purpose to an empty life.
Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and turns into a racket.
The opposite of the religious fanatic is not the fanatical atheist but the gentle cynic who cares not whether there is a god or not.
To know a person's religion we need not listen to his profession of faith but must find his brand of intolerance.
The best part of the art of living is to know how to grow old gracefully.
The poor on the borderline of starvation live purposeful lives. To be engaged in a desperate struggle for food and shelter is to be wholly free from a sense of futility.
However much we guard against it we tend to shape ourselves in the image others have of us.
Many of the insights of the saint stem from his experience as a sinner.
When we believe ourselves in possession of the only truth, we are likely to be indifferent to common everyday truths.
Disappointment is a sort of bankruptcy - the bankruptcy of a soul that expends too much in hope and expectation.
Where there is the necessary technical skill to move mountains, there is no need for the faith that moves mountains.