“Peter did not feel very brave; indeed, he felt he was going to be sick. But that made no difference to what he had to do.”

“Three hundred years of humiliation, abuse and deprivation cannot be expected to find voice in a whisper.”

“Nature intended me for the tranquil pursuits of science, by rendering them my supreme delight. But the enormities of the times in which I have lived, have forced me to take a part in resisting them, and to commit myself on the boisterous ocean of political passions.”

“I wasted some years trying to be like other people I knew, but I found that God won’t help us be anyone other than ourselves. Relax, learn to love yourself, and don’t be afraid that you won’t be able to do what you need to do. The truth is that none of us can do what we need to do without God’s help. If we look at only what we think we can do, we will all be frightened; but if we look at Jesus and focus on Him, He will give us the courage to go forward even in the presence of fear.”

“Every lie is a poison; there are no harmless lies. Only the truth is safe. Only the truth gives me consolation - it is the one unbreakable diamond.”

“It was not the people or the Roman soldiers who put [Jesus] on the cross—it was your sins and my sins that made it necessary for Him to volunteer his death.”

“Maybe the critics are right. Maybe there's no escaping our great political divide, an endless clash of armies, and any attempts to alter the rules of engagement are futile. Or maybe the trivialization of politics has reached a point of no return, so that most people see it as just one more diversion, a sport, with politicians our paunch-bellied gladiators and those who bother to pay attention just fans on the sidelines: We paint our faces red or blue and cheer our side and boo their side, and if it takes a late hit or cheap shot to beat the other team, so be it, for winning is all that matters. But I don't think so. They are out there, I think to myself, those ordinary citizens who have grown up in the midst of all the political and cultural battles, but who have found a way-in their own lives, at least- to make peace with their neighbors, and themselves. ...I imagine they are waiting for a politics with the maturity to balance idealism and realism, to distinguish between what can and cannot be compromised, to admit the possibility that the other side might sometimes have a point. They don't always understand the arguments between right and left, conservative and liberal, but they recognize the difference between dogma and common sense, responsibility and irresponsibility, between those things that last and those that are fleeting. They are out there, waiting for Republicans and Democrats to catch up with them.”

“We are products of our past, but we don't have to be prisoners of it.”

“Whenever you feel weak, God is reminding you to depend on him.”

“One legislator accused me of having a 19th-century attitude on law and order. That is a totally false charge. I have an 18th-century attitude. That is when the Founding Fathers made it clear that the safety of law-abiding citizens should be one of the government’s primary concerns.”

“Successful, effective people are those who launch directly into their major tasks and then discipline themselves to work steadily and single-mindedly until those tasks are complete.

“Rather than trying to control or confiscate guns, it might be smarter to offer free, public gun-safety courses. In countries like Switzerland, every man within a certain age range is required to possess a gun and to know how to use it, and Switzerland has one of the lowest gun homicide rates in the world. It is clear that guns do not kill people by themselves. Rather, people who are determined to kill will find whatever means are available to accomplish their mission.”

“Decide whether or not the goal is worth the risks involved. If it is, stop worrying.”

“Grace is the power of the Holy Spirit coming to us free of charge to enable you to do with ease what you could never do on your own with any amount of struggle and effort.”

“No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong.”