“All the religious wars that have caused blood to be shed for centuries...” — Umberto Eco Quote

“All the religious wars that have caused blood to be shed for centuries arise from passionate feelings and facile counter-positions, such as Us and Them, good and bad, white and black.”

“The thought that all experience will be lost at the moment of my death makes me feel pain and fear... What a waste, decades spent building up experience, only to throw it all away... We remedy this sadness by working. For example, by writing, painting, or building cities.”

“If people buy my books for vanity, I consider it a tax on idiocy.”

“I am not running for president, but I've always known if I ever did run for president - or local dogcatcher, for that matter - the boy I bullied would and should arise as a necessary ghost from my past.”

“By the early seventeenth century, a new consensus began to arise: the idea that man was born incompetent for society and remained so unless he was provided with 'education.'”

“Wanting to be in a Western film won't get me very far. Unless the opportunity arose, it doesn't matter how much I want to be in one. But if an opportunity did arise, no actor would pass it up.”