"We will not think noble because we are not noble. We will not live in beautiful harmony because there is no such thing in this world, nor should there be. We promise only to do our best and to live out our lives. Dear God, that's all we can promise in truth."

“There are people who eat earth and eat all the people on it like in the Bible with the locusts. Then there are people who stand around and watch them eat it. Sometimes I think it ain't right to stand and watch them do it.”

“Hellman at American Masters”

“Lonely people, in talking to each other can make each other lonelier.”

“Sad is a fake word for me to be using, I am still angry that their reason for disagreeing with McCarthy was too often his crude methods. . . . Many of the anti-Communists were, of course, honest men. But none of them . . . has stepped forward to admit a mistake. It is not necessary in this country; they too know that we are a people who do not remember much. I have written here that I have recovered. I mean it only in a worldly sense because I do not believe in recovery. The past, with its pleasures, its rewards, its foolishness, its punishments, is there for each of us forever, and it should be.”

“For every man who lives without freedom, the rest of us must face the guilt.”

“Hellman at the Internet Movie Database”