Christmas is a tonic for our souls. It moves us to think of others rather than of ourselves. It directs our thoughts to giving.

The only things one can admire at length are those one admires without knowing why.

It takes a long time to bring the past up to the present.

He who learns but does not think, is lost! He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger.

Like every parent, when you start your family, your life completely changes. And you completely live for someone else. I find that the most extraordinary thing. Your life is handed over to someone else. From that moment on, they come first in every choice you make. It’s the most wonderful thing.

I ask you to judge me by the enemies I have made.

Littera scripta manet – ‚The written word will remain‘. That’s true, but it won’t be that much comfort to me.

The value of a man should be seen in what he gives and not in what he is able to receive.

Old age is just a record of one’s whole life.

It seems, in fact, as though the second half of a man’s life is made up of nothing, but the habits he has accumulated during the first half.

Life levels all men. Death reveals the eminent.

People are trapped in history and history is trapped in them.

One must be poor to know the luxury of giving!

Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is probably the reason why so few engage in it.

If it’s all instruction, you get annoyed with it and bored, and you stop reading. If it’s all entertainment, you read it quite quickly, your heart going pitty-pat, pitty-pat. But when you finish, that’s it. You’re not going to think about it much afterward, apart from the odd nightmare. You’re not going to read that book again.

Like as the waves make towards the pebbl’d shore, so do our minutes, hasten to their end.

Real living is living for others.

It is a pleasant thing to reflect upon, and furnishes a complete answer to those who contend for the gradual degeneration of the human species, that every baby born into the world is a finer one than the last.

All who think cannot but see there is a sanction like that of religion which binds us in partnership in the serious work of the world.

We moralize among ruins.

If somebody thinks they’re a hedgehog, presumably you just give ‚em a mirror and a few pictures of hedgehogs and tell them to sort it out for themselves.

I try to give to the poor people for love what the rich could get for money. No, I wouldn’t touch a leper for a thousand pounds; yet I willingly cure him for the love of God.

In the business world, the rearview mirror is always clearer than the windshield.

A real Christian is a person who can give his pet parrot to the town gossip.

Alas! how little does the memory of these human inhabitants enhance the beauty of the landscape!

It is true we have won all our wars, but we have paid for them. We don’t want victories anymore.

To be able to throw one’s self away for the sake of a moment, to be able to sacrifice years for a woman’s smile – that is happiness.

It was one of those evenings when men feel that truth, goodness and beauty are one. In the morning, when they commit their discovery to paper, when others read it written there, it looks wholly ridiculous.

We are always doing something for posterity, but I would fain see posterity do something for us.

It is sadder to find the past again and find it inadequate to the present than it is to have it elude you and remain forever a harmonious conception of memory.

To be able to look back upon ones life in satisfaction, is to live twice.

Time stays, we go.

The progress of rivers to the ocean is not so rapid as that of man to error.

Our necessities never equal our wants.

Women have served all these centuries as looking glasses possessing the power of reflecting the figure of man at twice its natural size.

No one has ever become poor by giving.

I restore myself when I’m alone.

Giving is better than receiving because giving starts the receiving process.

Growing old has been the greatest surprise of my life.

It is a most mortifying reflection for a man to consider what he has done, compared to what he might have done.

God has given us two hands – one to receive with and the other to give with. We are not cisterns made for hoarding; we are channels made for sharing.

This isn’t life in the fast lane, it’s life in the oncoming traffic.

The main rule to me is to honor God with your life. To life a life of integrity. Not be selfish. You know, help others. But that’s really the essence of the Christian faith.

I think that God, in creating man, somewhat overestimated his ability.

The main reason Santa is so jolly is because he knows where all the bad girls live.

You don’t have the same mentality as you did five years ago – even one year. People are always changing, and I believe that everyone deserves the space to change and for people to recognize their change.

I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love.

Philosophy begins in wonder.

Great achievement is usually born of great sacrifice, and is never the result of selfishness.

O wise man! Give your wealth only to the worthy and never to others. The water of the sea received by the clouds is always sweet.

Lo, what huge heaps of littleness around!

Kindness is in our power, even when fondness is not.

Knowing that you are going to die is, I suspect, the beginning of wisdom.

The things hardest to bear are sweetest to remember.

Silence is golden when you can’t think of a good answer.

The first question which the priest and the Levite asked was: ‚If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?‘ But… the good Samaritan reversed the question: ‚If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?‘

In my case Pilgrim’s Progress consisted in my having to climb down a thousand ladders until I could reach out my hand to the little clod of earth that I am.

I have to live for others and not for myself: that’s middle-class morality.

At Christmas, I am always struck by how the spirit of togetherness lies also at the heart of the Christmas story. A young mother and a dutiful father with their baby were joined by poor shepherds and visitors from afar. They came with their gifts to worship the Christ child.

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

I always pass on good advice. It is the only thing to do with it. It is never of any use to oneself.