If faith never encounters doubt, if truth never struggles with error, if good never battles evil, how can faith know its own power? In my own pilgrimage, if I had to choose between a faith that has stared doubt in the eye and made it blink, or a naive faith that has never known the firing line of doubt, I will choose the former every time.

Jesus might have said, I became man for you. If you do not become God for me, you wrong me.

Meister Eckhart

Teachers, you don't teach a subject, you teach a child.

Deepa Bhushan

And if it's proud to have a heart that never hardens, and a temper that never tires, and a touch that never hurts, Miss Jenny struck in, flushed, she is proud.

Charles Dickens

I saw exactly one picture of Marx and one of Lenin in my whole stay, but it's been a long time since ideology had anything to do with it. Not without cunning, Fat Man and Little Boy gradually mutated the whole state belief system into a debased form of Confucianism, in which traditional ancestor worship and respect for order become blended with extreme nationalism and xenophobia. Near the southernmost city of Kaesong, captured by the North in 1951, I was taken to see the beautifully preserved tombs of King and Queen Kongmin. Their significance in F.M.-L.B. cosmology is that they reigned over a then unified Korea in the 14th century, and that they were Confucian and dynastic and left many lavish memorials to themselves. The tombs are built on one hillside, and legend has it that the king sent one of his courtiers to pick the site. Second-guessing his underling, he then climbed the opposite hill. He gave instructions that if the chosen site did not please him he would wave his white handkerchief. On this signal, the courtier was to be slain. The king actually found that the site was ideal. But it was a warm day and he forgetfully mopped his brow with the white handkerchief. On coming downhill he was confronted with the courtier's fresh cadaver and exclaimed, 'Oh dear.' And ever since, my escorts told me, the opposite peak has been known as 'Oh Dear Hill.'I thought this was a perfect illustration of the caprice and cruelty of absolute leadership, and began to phrase a little pun about Kim Jong Il being the 'Oh Dear Leader,' but it died on my lips.

Christopher Hitchens

A Great man is he who does not lose his childlike heart.

Mencius (Mengzi Mengtse)

Even in a gleefully negative comic, there is optimism, although it's slightly hidden: It comes out through a comic character's sheer tenacity. He keeps going and trying to find some sort of fulfillment regardless of his perpetual failure record. That's a form of hope, a form of optimism. Really hokey I know, but it's true.

Lev Yilmaz

'No Child Left Behind' requires states and school districts to ensure that all students are learning and are reaching their highest potential. Special education students should not be left out of these accountability mechanisms.

Dianne Feinstein

Im Krieg machen die Starken die Schwachen zu Sklaven, im Frieden machen die Reichen die Armen zu Sklaven.

Oscar Wilde

I travel for work, but recently, friends said I should take major trips.

Jeff Goldblum

This is the first age that's ever paid much attention to the future, which is a little ironic since we may not have one.

Arthur C. Clarke

I mean you might say he had a travelling post office, but also Barney was very, very active. He was a legal officer for the NAACP and they had a lot of problems after Pease.

Betty Hill

I awoke this morning with devout thanksgiving for my friends, the old and the new.

Ralph Waldo Emerson