“The only real flesh was the flesh that existed in his imagination. Since, therefore, he regarded the flesh as an ideal abstraction, rather than as a physical fact, he had relied on his spiritual st...”

“The Imperial Concubine was fully aware of her own beauty, and she tended to be attracted by any force, such as religion, that treated her beauty and her high rank as things of no value.”

“True beauty is something that attacks, overpowers, robs, and finally destroys.”

“The blossoms seem unusually lovely this year. There were none of the scarlet-and-white-striped curtains that are set up among the blossoming trees so invariably that one has to come to think of the...”

“Beauty is something that burns the hand when you touch it.”

“And it seemed increasingly obvious that the world would have to topple if he was to attain the glory that was rightfully his. They were consubstantial: glory and the capsized world.”

“Creativity is the state of consciousness in which you enter into the treasury of your innermost being and bring the beauty into manifestation. (p.232)”

“Do you think I'm pretty?I think you're beautifulBeautiful?You are so beautiful, it hurts sometimes.”

“As if you were on fire from within.The moon lives in the lining of your skin.”

“[The moon] ... is an example of practiced stability it wanes when it must, and reliably returns to full strength it is a humble model of reasonable potential that I can emulate, and follow.”

“I love to close my eyes a moment and think of the land outside, white under the mingled snow and moonlight--the heaps of stones by the roadside white--snow in the furrows. Mon Dieu! How quiet and h...”

“I made a wish on a sliver of moonlightA sly grin and a bowl full of stars”

“Saturday night is perfect for writers because other people have "plans.”

“Night is certainly more novel and less profane than day.”

“I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night.”