“Love does not begin and end the way we seem to think it does. Love is a battle, love is a war; love is a growing up.”

“Love takes off the masks we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within.”

“I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.”

“If the concept of God has any validity or any use, it can only be to make us larger, freer, and more loving. If God cannot do this, then it is time we got rid of Him.”

“Life is tragic simply because the earth turns and the sun inexorably rises and sets, and one day, for each of us, the sun will go down for the last, last time. Perhaps the whole root of our trouble...”

“For I amor I wasone of those people who pride themselves in on their willpower, on their ability to make a decision and carry it through. This virtue, like most virtues, is ambiguity itself. People...”

“I would not have you descend into your own dream. I would have you be a conscious citizen of this terrible and beautiful world.”

“The best of humanity's recorded history is a creative balance between horrors endured and victories achieved, and so it was during the Harlem Renaissance.”

“This is the basis, and I am not being tried for whether I am a Communist, I am being tried for fighting for the right of my people, who are still second-class citizens in this United States of America”

“There comes a time in your life when you have to choose to turn the page, write another book or simply close it.”

“I live alone," he said simply. "I live in the open. I hear the waves at night and see the black patterns of the pine boughs against the sky. With sound and silence and color and solitude, of course...”

“It is difficult to undo our own damage, and to recall to our presence that which we have asked to leave. It is hard to desecrate a grove and change your mind. The very holy mountains are keeping mu...”

“Men build too many walls and not enough bridges.”

“My request today is simple. Today. Tomorrow. Next week. Find somebody, anybody, thats different than you. Somebody that has made you feel ill-will or even hateful. Somebody whose life decisions hav...”

“Dont we get it? To put our arm around someone who is gay, someone who has an addiction, somebody who lives a different lifestyle, someone who is not what we think they should be doing that has noth...”