Most of the Ten Commandments are negative. The purpose of law is not to mandate good behavior. That concept comes from the French Revolution.
I don't think Auden liked my poetry very much, he's very Anglican.
Death's not a separation or alteration or parting; it's just a one-handled door.
It is the privilege of the rich To waste the time of the poor To water with tears in secret A tree that grows in secret That bears fruit in secret That ripened falls to the ground in secret And manures the parent tree Oh the wicked tree of hatred and the secret The sap rising and the tears falling.
This is the simplest of all thoughts, that Death must come when we call, although he is a god.
I love Death because he breaks the human pattern and frees us from pleasures too prolonged as well as from the pains of this world. It is pleasant, too, to remember that Death lies in our hands; he must come if we call him. . . . I think if there were no death, life would be more than flesh and blood could bear.
I like food, I like stripping vegetables of their skins, I like to have a slim young parsnip under my knife.
What's the need of working if it doesn't get you anywhere? What's the use of boring around in the same hole like a worm? Making the hole bigger to stay in?
You've got to be able to know someone really well to be able to have a row and then also walk away from it and not have it matter, especially in this business. That doesn't mean to say we have many rows but I think the nearest thing to a row would be just flatly disagreeing with something.
COOPERATION means to be willing to sacrifice for the sake of others
My dear father always said that when everybody had a telephone nobody would have any manners, because there wouldn't be time for them. And of course he was perfectly right.