Truth must necessarily be stranger than fiction; for fiction is the creation of the human mind and therefore congenial to it.
Creation • Fiction • Human
Men do not differ much about what things they will call evils; they differ enormously about what evils they will call excusable.
Ethics • Morality • Perception
There are some desires that are not desirable.
Human • Morality • Philosophy
Fairy tales do not tell children the dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children the dragons can be killed.
Children • Courage • Imagination
You can only find truth with logic if you have already found truth without it.
Knowledge • Philosophy • Reason
People wonder why the novel is the most popular form of literature; people wonder why it is read more than books of science or books of metaphysics. The reason is very simple; it is merely that the novel is more true than they are.
Metaphysics • Popularity • Science
The way to love anything is to realize that it may be lost.
Awareness • Gratitude • Loss
By a curious confusion, many modern critics have passed from the proposition that a masterpiece may be unpopular to the other proposition that unless it is unpopular it cannot be a masterpiece.
Art • Criticism • Popularity
If there were no God, there would be no atheists.
Beliefs • Philosophy • Religion
The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him.
Duty • Love • Military
The paradox of courage is that a man must be a little careless of his life in order to keep it.
Awareness • Courage • Risk
Literature is a luxury; fiction is a necessity.
Fiction • Luxury
