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The reader should be reminded that it was crusaders and not the Muslims who originally sacked Constantinople, which should have caused perpetual scepticism about the value of noble causes. Apparently it has not, as the human race is incapable of learning anything from history.’
‘Did you know that childhood is the only time in our lives when insanity is not only permitted to us, but expected?’
every man needs an obsession in order to enjoy life, and it was so much the better if that obsession was constructive.
We should care for each other more than we care for ideas, or else we will end up killing each other.
‘Empedocles said that God is a circle whose centre is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere. If that is true, then I don’t need to go to church. And I don’t need to believe the same things as you to see that you have a purpose.
‘Symmetry is only a property of dead things. Did you ever see a tree or a mountain that was symmetrical? It’s fine for buildings, but if you ever see a symmetrical human face, you will have the impression that you ought to think it beautiful, but that in fact you find it cold. The human heart likes a little disorder in its geometry,
Love is a temporary madness, it erupts like volcanoes and then subsides. And when it subsides you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is.
One can only forgive a sin after the sinner has finished committing it, because we cannot allow ourselves to condone it whilst it is still being perpetrated.
‘Madonna Maria, Dottore, please tell me some lies.’ ‘I am not Pinocchio. The truth will make us free. We overcome by looking it in the eyes.’
‘When loved ones die, you have to live on their behalf. See things as though with their eyes. Remember how they used to say things, and use those words oneself. Be thankful that you can do things that they cannot, and also feel the sadness of
This was because he spent nearly all his time at the taverna in his grandmother’s care, being cooed over by pink and sentimental foreigners who loved olive-skinned little boys with black fringes over their ebony eyes, just as long as they did not grow older and come to their own countries looking for employment.
