"I don't believe in the god of the Christians who gave his son in order to save mankind. That's a myth. But why should it have arisen if it didn't express some deep-seated intuition in men? I don't know what I believe, because it's instinctive, and how can you describe an instinct with words? I have an instinct that the power that rules us, human beings, animals and things, is a dark and cruel power and that everything has to be paid for, a power that demands an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, and that though we may writhe and squirm we have to submit, for the power is ourselves."

“After all, a man marries to have a home, but also because he doesn't want to be bothered with sex and all that sort of thing.”

“I don't think of the past. The only thing that matters is the everlasting present.”

“Conscience is the guardian in the individual of the rules which the community has evolved for its own preservation.”

“He was the kind of man with whom one would have hesitated to pass a lonely evening, but with whom one might cheerfully have looked forward to spending six months.”

“You are not angry with people when you laugh at them. Humour teaches tolerance, and the humorist, with a smile and perhaps a sigh, is more likely to shrug his shoulders than to condemn.”

“The artist produces for the liberation of his soul. It is his nature to create as it is the nature of water to run down the hill.”