“It has seemed to be more necessary to have regard to the weight of words rather than to their number.”

“Old age is by nature rather talkative.”

“Old age especially an honoured old age has so great authority that this is of more value than all the pleasures of youth.”

“When you are aspiring to the highest place it is honorable to reach the second or even the third rank.”

“Borrowing from Peter to pay Paul.”

“If you aspire to the highest place it is no disgrace to stop at the second or even the third place.”

“They had killed themselves over our dying forests, over manatees maimed by propellers as they surfaced to drink from garden hoses; they had killed themselves at the sight of used tires stacked high...”

“The world seemed to shimmer a little at the edges.”

“If we cannot accept the importance of the world, which considers itself important, if in the midst of that world our laughter finds no echo, we have but one choice: to take the world as a whole and...”