“Some people claim that expectation is the source of all misery, while others claim that attachment is the root cause.”

“For of all the miseries attaching to miserable love, the worst is the misery of thinking that the passion which is the cause of them all may cease.”

“The tendency to claim God as an ally for our partisan value and ends is the source of all religious fanaticism.”

“Some people confess guilt to claim credit for the sin.”

“The roots below the earth claim no rewards for making the branches fruitful.”

“There are as many perfections as there are imperfect men. And while to the claims of charity a man may yield and yet be free, to the claims of conformity no man may yield and remain free at all.”

“The overly cautious man will claim that his safety is more important than his accomplishments. While the adventurer will claim the opposite, because death does not scare him at all.”

“Not a single one of our ancient sources indicates that Jesus was married, let alone married to Mary Magdalene. All such claims are part of modern fictional reconstructions of Jesus' life, not rooted in the surviving accounts themselves. The historical approach to our sources may not be as exciting and sensationalist as fictional claims about Jesus (he kept a lover! he had sex! he made babies!), but there's something to be said for knowing what really happened in history, even if it is not as titillating as what happens in novels.”

“Some colored people so scared of whitefolks they claim to love the cotton gin.”

“The less justified a man is in claiming excellence for his own self, the more ready he is to claim all excellence for his nation, his religion, his race or his holy cause.”