But I knew that I would have to live forever with what I did on that night of dying, and that if I chose to be a coward, I would have to repeat such … - Kate Horsley

I asked her if affection was not also a strong means of enduring human life. I said that men fear affection because it is stronger than power and one must only have brute force to wield power but must have strength deeper than flesh to wield affection. For with affection comes great sorrow, the sorrow of inevitable death, but also with affection comes joy and peace that power can never give.

I wish that I could thoroughly believe in some creed. I wish that I was ignorant enough to know one truth and discard all others.

Life itself seems a ritual of sacrifice, and the world the altar on which plants and animals lay their own lives for the sustenance of others, and on which we lay our youth, our well-being, our loved ones, and finally our lives...Self-hatred seems to me an evil thing in itself rather than an antidote to evil. If we practice self-hatred, then the sacrifice we make of ourselves and our lives is not sacred, for it is then a gift of something we hate rather than of something that we have nurtured and loved.