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The desire of talking of ourselves, and showing those faults we do not mind having seen, makes up a good part of our sincerity.

There are things to confess that enrich the world, and things that need not be said.

There are some things that we know are just not as pleasant as the lies that we tell ourselves, and in that sense in order to endure existence everyone endures a certain amount of dishonesty in their everyday lives.

Anyone can identify with those moments in life where circumstances or people inform us that we've strayed from the path of our better nature and intentions. We know what that's like, and we resist it - so as not to feel like we're bad people.

It is the peculiar quality of a fool to perceive the faults of others and to forget his own.

Sadly, we do a much better job of making people feel guilty than we do of delivering them from the guilt we create. We need to confess this and change our ways.

The keynote of simple folk is bad manners, familiarity. They intrude on one's private soul.

A man can look upon his life and accept it as good or evil; it is far, far harder for him to confess that it has been unimportant in the sum of things.

As we look around, it's very clear that in this world people do outrageous things to one another all of the time. It's not that these qualities or actions make us bad people, but they bring tremendous suffering if we don't know how to work with them.

We don't know where our first impressions come from or precisely what they mean, so we don't always appreciate their fragility.