« If two people who are strangers, as we all are, suddenly let down the wall that separated them, and feel close, feel one, this moment of uniqueness is one of the most invigorating and moving experiences of life. It is all the more wonderful and miraculous for people who have lived apart, isolated, without love. This miracle of sudden intimacy is often facilitated if it associates with, or is aroused by attraction and sexual consumption. However, by its very nature, this type of love is not lasting. The two people become accustomed to each other, their intimacy loses more and more its miraculous character, until their antagonism, their disappointments, their mutual boredom, kill what may have survived the initial excitement. »

« The most sadistic and destructive man is human - as human as the saint. `...` These considerations do not imply that destruction and cruelty are not vices; they simply mean that vice is human. They are destructive of the life, body and spirit not only of the victim, but also of the destroyer. They are a paradox: they express that life turns against itself in its effort to make sense of itself. They are the only real perversions. Understanding them is not apologizing to them. »

« The ability to think objectively is the reason; the emotional attitude that underlies reason is humility. To be objective, to use one's reason is only possible if one has acquired an attitude of humility, if one has freed oneself from the dreams of omniscience and omnipotence that haunted our childhood. »