We cannot know whether we love God, although there may be strong reason for thinking so; but there can be no doubt about whether we love our neighbor or not. Be sure that, in proportion as you advance in fraternal charity, you are increasing your love of God, for His Majesty bears so tender an affection for us that I cannot doubt He will repay our love for others by augmenting, and in a thousand different ways, that which we bear for Him.

Politics is the art of preventing people from sticking their noses in things that are properly their business.

Forget yourself when with others and others will not forget you.

Forgiveness is primarily for our own sake, so that we no longer carry the burden of resentment. But to forgive does not mean we will allow injustice again.

You have no idea how promising the world begins to look once you have decided to have it all for yourself. And how much healthier your decisions are once they become entirely selfish.

Nothing defines the quality of life in a community more clearly than people who regard themselves, or whom the consensus chooses to regard, as mentally unwell.

The desire of love is to give. The desire of lust is to get.

The die was now cast; I had passed the Rubicon. Swim or sink, live or die, survive or perish with my country was my unalterable determination.

I never knew what real happiness was until I got married. And by then it was too late.

The horn of plenty is usually the one behind you in traffic!

Men are more satirical from vanity than from malice.

A proverb is no proverb to you until life has illustrated it.

Feast of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, Martyr, 1170 Come down, O Christ, and help me! reach Thy hand For I am drowning in a stormier sea Than Simon on the the lake of Galilee: The wine of life is spilt upon the sand, My heart is as some famine-murdered land Whence all good things have perished utterly, And well I know my soul in Hell must lie If I this night before God's throne must stand. "He sleeps perchance, or rideth to the chase, Like Baal, when his prophets holed that name From morn to noon on Carmel's smitten height." Nay, peace! I shall behold, before the night, The feet of brass, the robe more white than flame, The wounded hands, the weary human face.

Cheer up, children, I am all right.

Multitudinous echoes awoke and died in the distance. . . . . And, when the echoes had ceased, like a sense of pain was the silence.

If we do not believe in ourselves- neither in our efficacy nor in our goodness- the universe is a frightening place.

They cannot commit treason, nor be outlawed, nor excommunicated, for they have no souls.

Avarice has ruined more souls than extravagance.

Feast of Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, Martyr, c.107 Grace is the incomprehensible fact that God is well pleased with a man, and that a man can rejoice in God. Only when grace is recognized to be incomprehensible is it grace. Grace exists, therefore, only where the Resurrection is reflected. Grace is the gift of Christ, who exposes the gulf which separates God and man, and, by exposing it, bridges it.

When in doubt, make a fool of yourself. There is a microscopically thin line between being brilliantly creative and acting like the most gigantic idiot on earth. So what the hell, leap.