What is a saint supposed to do, if not convert wolves? - Umberto Eco

It's true, I'd never understood whether this vogue for apologising is a sign of humility or of impudence: you do something you shouldn't have done, then you apologise and wash your hands of it. It reminds me of the old joke about a cowboy riding across the prairie who hears a voice from heaven telling him to go to Abilene, then at Abilene the voice tells him to go into the saloon and put all his money on number five. Tempted by the voice, he obeys, number eighteen comes up, and the voice murmur, Too bad, we've lost.

نظرگاه دینی همیشه شیوه های آرمانی زیستن را عرضه می کند، در حالی که فرد غیر مذهبی زندگی آرمانی را در انتخاب آزاد می بیند، مادامی که این انتخاب، انتخاب آزاد دیگران را مخدوش نکند

There must be a connection between the lust for power and impotentia coeundi. I liked Marx, I was sure that he and his Jenny had made love merrily. You can feel it in the easy pace of his prose and in his humor. On the other hand, I remember remarking one day in the corridors of the university that if you screwed Krupskaya all the time, you'd end up writing a lousy book like Materialism and Empiriocriticism.