"It is a good thing to learn early that other peoples opinions do not matter, unless they happen to be true."
Phyllis Forbes Dennis was a British novelist and short story writer.
"The only creative power I know is that of what might roughly be called "love"; not of course a sentimental love: a far more impersonal and less individual emotion. I sometimes think that migratory birds may have it for each other. They fly in the same direction, and have never been seen to interfere with each others flights."
"The words her father had said to her, echoed over and over in her memory — "Love generously, wisely, and without haste!" She thought that wisdom was in the simple joy of her lover’s eyes; about generosity Freya did not think at all — for those who practise it never weigh it — but the word "haste" she blotted out of her mind."
"Psychology...is a science, not a sort of Savonarola. It cannot reform people against their wills. It can only provide a better method of mixing the human ingredients presented to it. As it is a social science it must depend as much upon the patients willingness to be cured, as upon the physicians skill in curing. There is neither force nor magic in psychiatry."
"A doctor is a man who, if his career is well-chosen, looks upon himself as a guardian of life; he cannot take lightly what infringes the rights of his great charge.And yet can life be made undignified by any act of man? Life is being interrupted on these nights by mans obscenity, as nature is interrupted by storms, or by the explosions of pent-up gases; but such catastrophes are not permanent, as are the laws of nature. Nor are these cruel obscenities from the innocent skies, made by man against his brother, capable of inflicting any real indignity upon life. They will cease, and life itself will be unchanged by them."
"I wonder how often not the intention but the desire springs up in a doctors mind: "Can I let this human being out of the trap of Life?"
"[T]o be a Jew is to belong to an old harmless race that has lived in every country in the world; and that has enriched every country it has lived in.It is to be strong with a strength that has outlived persecutions. It is to be wise against ignorance, honest against piracy, harmless against evil, industrious against idleness, kind against cruelty! It is to belong to a race that has given Europe its religion; its moral law; and much of its science — perhaps even more of its genius — in art, literature and music.This is to be a Jew; and you know now what is required of you! You have no country but the world; and you inherit nothing but wisdom and brotherhood. I do not say that there are no bad Jews — userers; cowards; corrupt and unjust persons — but such people are also to be found among Christians. I only say to you this is to be a good Jew. Every Jew has this aim brought before him in his youth. He refuses it at his peril; and at his peril he accepts it."