Light in August

Memory believes before knowing remembers.

Even a liar can be scared into telling the truth, same as an honest man can be tortured into telling a lie.

Man knows so little about his fellows. In his eyes all men or women act upon what he believes would motivate him if he were mad enough to do what the other man or woman is doing.

Poor man. Poor mankind.

... ingenuity was apparently given man in order that he may supply himself in crisis with shapes and sounds with which to guard himself from truth.

... a fellow is more afraid of the trouble he might have than he ever is of the trouble he’s already got. He’ll cling to trouble he’s used to before he’ll risk a change. Yes. A man will talk about how he’d like to escape from living folks. But it’s the dead folks that do him the damage. It’s the dead ones that lay quiet in one place and don’t try to hold him, that he can’t escape from.’