"He was a philosopher, if you know what that was.’‘A man who dreams of fewer things than there are in heaven and earth,’ said the Savage promptly.‘Quite so…"
"But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin."
"Words can be like X-rays if you use them properly -- they’ll go through anything. You read and you’re pierced."
"Actual happiness always looks pretty squalid in comparison with the overcompensations for misery. And, of course, stability isn't nearly so spectacular as instability. And being contented has none of the glamour of a good fight against misfortune, none of the picturesqueness of a struggle with temptation, or a fatal overthrow by passion or doubt. Happiness is never grand."
"Great is truth, but still greater, from a practical point of view, is silence about truth."
"I ate civilization. It poisoned me; I was defiled. And then,"he added in a lower tone, "I ate my own wickedness."