Robert M. Pirsig, author and philosopher (b. 1928)

When people are fanatically dedicated to political or religious faiths or any other kind of dogmas or goals, it's always because these dogmas or goals are in doubt. -Robert M. Pirsig, author and philosopher (b. 1928)

I don’t know what counts as “fanatical dedication” to Pirsig, but as it stands I would say this is baloney, typical modern pseudo-sophistication. I would be less annoyed if he had left out the “always.” But perhaps it is a Zen thing that I should be less critical of.

Aldous Huxley, novelist (1894-1963)

The more powerful and original a mind, the more it will incline towards the religion of solitude. -Aldous Huxley, novelist (1894-1963)

I don’t think this is necessarily true, especially if one’s religion is Christianity rather that the religion of solitude. Powerful and original Christian minds realize that what they have is a gift intended to benefit others, so they forgo solitude, at least to some extent, in favor of service.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, novelist, Nobel laureate (1918-2008)

We do not err because truth is difficult to see. It is visible at a glance. We err because this is more comfortable. -Alexander Solzhenitsyn, novelist, Nobel laureate (1918-2008)

I don’t think it is as simple as this quote seems to suggest. True, sometimes we turn away from the truth we see because of sloth, but some people work very hard to promote something they believe in passionately, but which is in fact false. It is hard to imagine that they see the truth but are expending so much effort to undermine it. It seems to me that they are blinded by ideology, which makes useful discussion very difficult.

Edith Wharton, novelist (1862-1937)

I begin to see what marriage is for. It's to keep people away from each other. Sometimes I think that two people who love each other can be saved from madness only by the things that come between them: children, duties, visits, bores, relations, the things that protect married people from each other. -Edith Wharton, novelist (1862-1937)

It is sad that anyone would come to this conclusion about marriage, especially someone as influential, at least in her own time, as Edith Wharton. In Christian marriage, at any rate, husband and wife become one flesh, and not just physically but one in mind and heart. The danger in a Christian marriage is precisely that children, duties, and other such things will come between them.

Bill Copeland

"Try to be like the turtle - at ease in your own shell." -- Bill Copeland

What does this mean?  Be at ease in your own body? That’s good!
Be happily isolated from the world around you, including the social world? Not a good idea!

Viktor Frankl, author, neurologist and psychiatrist, Holocaust survivor (1905-1997)

What is to give light must endure burning. -Viktor Frankl, author, neurologist and psychiatrist, Holocaust survivor (1905-1997)

Add to this the quote from the desert fathers: If you will you can be all flame.

Plato

"Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws." – Plato

One of the purposes of law is to train the person in what it means to be good, so laws have an important function for the good as well as to restrain the evil.