“I have lived in this tree, in this same hollow,” the owl said, “for more years than anyone can remember. But now, when the wind blows hard in winter and rocks the forest, I sit here in the dark, and from deep down in the bole, near the roots, I hear a new sound. It is the sound of strands of wood creaking in the cold and snapping one by one. The limbs are falling; the tree is old, and it is dying. Yet I cannot bring myself, after so many years, to leave, to find a new home and move into it, perhaps to fight for it. I, too, have grown old. One of these days, one of these years, the tree will fall, and when it does, if I am still alive, I will fall with it.”

“To be evenminded is the greatest virtue.Wisdom is to speakthe truth and actin keeping with its nature.”

“I understood then, with absolute certainty, that theability of the horse to sense emotion, energy and spirit isbeyond what most of the human world realises. This is whytheir impact on us can be so instant, so consistentlypositive, so transformational.”

“When you talk, don’t talk to express your ego. Talk to reveal beauty to your listeners.”

“Dieting is the only game where you win when you lose!”

“She’s my kitten, and no one else’s.”

“I realized how truly hard it was, really, to see someone you love change right before your eyes. Not only is it scary, it throws your balance off as well.”

“The long run is a misleading guide to current affairs. In the long run we are all dead.”

“You can do anything you want to do, if you want to do it bad enough.”

“seeing a woman cough today made me sense a vague fear of death”

“The country and culture commonly known as “America” had had a badly split personality all through its history. Its overt laws were almost always puritanical for a people whose covert behavior tended to be Rabelaisian; its major religions were all Apollonian in varying degrees—its religious revivals were often hysterical in a fashion almost Dionysian.”

“Mortals are odd creatures in that sense—flawed yet hopeful. One can study them through millennia and still get nowhere near full understanding of their nature.”

“If you’re afraid of everyone leaving you, what do you do?”Make them stay.”And if you can’t do that, or don’t know how to?”Ellie shrugged. “I don’t know.”Yes, you do. In fact, you’ve done it. You leave first,” Coop said, “so you don’t have to watch them walk away.”

“She wondered which was worse—living your whole life staring at yourself or waiting your whole life for someone to stare back at you.”

“If the partridge didn’t call at the wrong moment, Neither the hunter nor the falcon would know of it. It follows from this point also, That everyone’s voice betrays him.”