After the first blush of sin comes its indifference.

If the machine of government is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law.

The world forgetting, by the world forgot.

In every phenomenon the beginning remains always the most notable moment.

We all want progress, but if you’re on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road; in that case, the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive.

To suffer the penalty of too much haste, which is too little speed.

Life cannot be without relationship, but we have made it so agonizing and hideous by basing it on personal and possessive love. Can one love and yet not possess? You will find the true answer not in escape, ideals, beliefs but through the understanding of the causes of dependence and possessiveness.

Do not ask for what you will wish you had not got.

Sacrifice, discipline and prayer are essential. We gain strength through God’s word. We receive grace from the sacrament. And when we fumble due to sin – and it’s gonna happen – confession puts us back on the field.

The first step in a person’s salvation is knowledge of their sin.

Cruelty is, perhaps, the worst kid of sin. Intellectual cruelty is certainly the worst kind of cruelty.

My heart aches for America and its deceived people.

Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in.

Mortals are easily tempted to pinch the life out of their neighbour’s buzzing glory, and think that such killing is no murder.

In rivers, the water that you touch is the last of what has passed and the first of that which comes; so with present time.

To walk through the ruined cities of Germany is to feel an actual doubt about the continuity of civilization.

It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.

Every guilty person is his own hangman.

Traveling around the world and preaching for over 70 years did not give much time for reflection.

I’m reflective only in the sense that I learn to move forward. I reflect with a purpose.

Justice consists in doing no injury to men; decency in giving them no offense.

Every action has a consequence. It may be good for strengthening. And I have no doubt that lifting a lot of weights can get you stronger. I just don’t know if lifting stronger weights can keep you healthy, or it can keep you doing your job better, especially for a pro athlete.

The effect of liberty to individuals is that they may do what they please: we ought to see what it will please them to do, before we risk congratulations.

Changing your mind is probably one of the most beautiful things people can do. And I’ve changed my mind about a lot of things over the years.

I’m not the same man I used to be, I’m not out hell-raising, stuff like that. I am a changed man.

That old law about ‚an eye for an eye‘ leaves everybody blind. The time is always right to do the right thing.

The desire to annoy no one, to harm no one, can equally well be the sign of a just as of an anxious disposition.

An Englishman thinks he is moral when he is only uncomfortable.

Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, ‚What are you doing for others?‘

I think God gives every one of us our own will, and unfortunately, some people choose to do evil things with it.

In my younger days, I was trying to write sophisticated prose and fantastic stories.

Wars are not paid for in wartime, the bill comes later.

For Africa to me… is more than a glamorous fact. It is a historical truth. No man can know where he is going unless he knows exactly where he has been and exactly how he arrived at his present place.

Sometimes we look back and 10 years from now we think, ‚Boy, those were great old days.‘ Well, you know, we’re living in the good old days.

How did it get so late so soon? Its night before its afternoon. December is here before its June. My goodness how the time has flewn. How did it get so late so soon?

It is a man’s own mind, not his enemy or foe, that lures him to evil ways.

There is no love of life without despair of life.

Reverence for life is the highest court of appeal.

A sinner can no more repent and believe without the Holy Spirit’s aid than he can create a world.

The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom.

The difference is too nice – Where ends the virtue or begins the vice.

Justice is truth in action.

You can wipe out your opponents. But if you do it unjustly you become eligible for being wiped out yourself.

A man who has never gone to school may steal from a freight car; but if he has a university education, he may steal the whole railroad.

Write down the thoughts of the moment. Those that come unsought for are commonly the most valuable.

Thinking: the talking of the soul with itself.

Knowledge becomes evil if the aim be not virtuous.

Every parting gives a foretaste of death, every reunion a hint of the resurrection.

I don’t concern myself with award. I’d been to the party enough times to know it really didn’t matter.

My father had died, and very swiftly, too, of cancer of the esophagus. He was 79. I am 61. In whatever kind of a ‚race‘ life may be, I have very abruptly become a finalist.

The books that the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame.

I seated ugliness on my knee, and almost immediately grew tired of it.

Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught.

Reflect upon your present blessings of which every man has many – not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some.

What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others.

The human voice can never reach the distance that is covered by the still small voice of conscience.

Seriousness is the only refuge of the shallow.

Morality is of the highest importance – but for us, not for God.

I think there is a sense of being forced at this time to look at America’s really large shadow and that’s not all that bad.

Give thy thoughts no tongue.

It is a great piece of folly to attempt to make anything out of my early life.