Great Throughts Treasury

"Word - that invisible dagger."

"Years and years to waken from that sleep in which the others loll; then years and years to scape that awakening..."

"You are alive only when you live by the skin of your teeth."

"You were wrong to count on me. Who can speak in terms? God and the Failure."

"Write books only if you are going to say in them the things you would never dare confide to anyone."

"You are done for - a living dead man - not when you stop loving but stop hating. Hatred preserves: in it, in its chemistry, resides the "mystery" of life."

"You will suffer from everything, and to excess: the winds will seem gales; every touch a dagger; smiles, slaps; trifles, cataclysms. Waking may come to an end, but its light survives within you; one does not see in the dark with impunity, one does not gather its lessons without danger; there are eyes which can no longer learn anything from the sun, and souls afflicted by nights from which they will never recover."