“Meeks was telling him about the value of work. He said that it had been his personal experience that if you wanted to get ahead, you had to work. He said this was the law of life and it was no way ...”

“No one can be an atheist who does not know all things. Only God is an atheist.”

“He loved her because it was his nature to do so, but there were times when he could not endure her love for him. There were times when it became nothing but pure idiot mystery...”

“Accepting oneself does not preclude an attempt to become better.”

“Everywhere I go I'm asked if I think the university stifles writers. My opinion is that they don't stifle enough of them. There's many a best-seller that could have been prevented by a good teacher.”

“I don't deserve any credit for turning the other cheek as my tongue is always in it.”

“There is no competition in work. Whoever loves to labour does so as grace of life.”

“...whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. And peace will be with you.”

“If perception is limited to experience and knowledge, what proof do we have of moral judgement?”

“And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise. The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt.”

“You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you.”

“The road to hell is paved with adverbs.”