Never trust the teller, trust the tale. The proper function of a critic is to save the tale from the artist who created it.

The more i live, the more i realize what strange creatures human beings are. some of them might just as well have a hundred legs, like a centipede, or six, like a lobster. the human consistency and dignity one has been led to expect from one's fellow-man seem actually non-existent. one doubts if they exist to any startling degree even in oneself.

She lost her illusions in the collapse of her sympathies.

I have travelled, and looked at the world, and loved it. Now I don't want to look at the world anymore, there seems nothing there. In not-looking, and in not-seeing comes a new strength and undeniable new gods share their life with us, when we cease to see.

The world is supposed to be full of possibilities, but they narrow down to pretty few in most personal experience. There's lots of good fish in the sea . . . maybe . . . but the vast masses seem to be mackerel or herring, and if you're not mackerel or herring yourself, you are likely to find very few good fish in the sea.

Well, if one had to prostitute oneself, let it be to a bitch-goddess!

A man has to fend and fettle for the best, and then trust in something beyond himself. You can't insure against the future, except by really believing in the best of you and in the power beyond it.

John Wanamaker, founder of the stores that bear his name, once confessed: I learned thirty years ago that it is foolish to scold. I have enough trouble overcoming my own limitations without fretting over the fact that God has not seen fit to distribute evenly the gift of intelligence.

I learned thirty years ago that it is foolish to scold. I have enough trouble overcoming my own limitations without fretting over the fact that God has not seen fit to distribute evenly the gift of intelligence.

Argue not concerning God,…re-examine all that you have been told at church or school or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your soul…

Stand up for the Crazy and Stupid

Thought Of obedience, faith, adhesiveness; As I stand aloof and look there is to me something profoundly affecting in large masses of men following the lead of those who do not believe in men.