“God doesn't believe in the easy way.”

“...and gentle happy and peaceful, tasting the mean goodness of their living like the last of their suppers in their mouths.”

“And somewhat as in blind night, on a mild sea, a sailor may be made aware of an iceberg, fanged and mortal, bearing invisibly near, by the unwarned charm of its breath, nothingness now revealed its...”

“God is not here, Hannah said to herself; and made a small cross upon her breastbone, against her blasphemy.”

“How far we all come. How far we all come away from ourselves. So far, so much between, you can never go home again. You can go home, it's good to go home, but you never really get all the way home ...”

“We come to love not by finding a perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly.”

“When the people whom we love the most leave us, we start learning to live with the shadows they have left inside us.”

“The learnin' mind is the livin' mind... an' any sort o' smart is truesome smart, old smart or new, high smart or low.”