“All is artifice in my world, Constantine. Even me. Especially me. He taught me to be a duchess, to be an impregnable fortress, to be the guardian of my own heart, But he admitted that he could not ...”

“I prefer to believe the opposite - that there is always an indestructible beauty at the heart of darkness.”

“The ugliness at the heart of beauty. Is there always ugliness, do you suppose? Even when the object is very, very beautiful?”

“Why did people assume that the beautiful among them needed nothing but their beauty to bring them happiness? That behind the beauty there was nothing but an empty shell, insensitive shell?”

“Suddenly, and for the first time, he was at the center of his own life, living it and loving it.”

“He had always felt that he lived on the edges of life, Constantine realized, watching everyone else living, sometimes helping them do it.”

“If you want to be happy, work with all your heart.”

“I do my best thinking at night when everyone else is sleeping. No interruptions. No noise. I like the feeling of being awake when no one else is.”

“I feel like Ive been split open and stuffed with sunshine.”

“Today I want to belong. I want to feel safe and at home. I want to be aware of what it is like simply to be, without defenses or desires. I will appreciate the flow of life for what it is-my own tr...”

“Nature reflects the moods of the wizard.”

“My calling ties me to no office, makes me no man's slave, compels me to no action which my soul condemns. It sets me free from town life, which I loathe; and allows me to breathe clean air, to exer...”

“I shiver, thinking how easy it is to be totally wrong about people-to see one tiny part of them and confuse it for the whole, to see the cause and think it's the effect or vice versa”

“At sunrise everything is luminous but not clear.”

“I think it's impossible to really understand somebody, what they want, what they believe, and not love them the way they love themselves.”