30 Quotes by Andrew Levkoff

The past is set down in a thousand thousand indelible scrolls. But the future is a blank parchment forever in wait of a present.

Why must there always be a price to pay for every indulgence, and why must it so often be withdrawn from the bankrupt accounts of the innocent?

I advise, however, moderation in this task of setting goals, or else risk becoming tangled up in a Gordian knot of life’s many disappointments.

They say in moments of great fear or desperation, a man will always make a choice—either to flee or face his enemy, but choice requires thought, and in the moment when you know for certain that death is stalking you with strides you cannot outrun, there is no time for thought. You do not choose. Like Betto, or Malchus, or Valens, you act, doing either one thing or the other.

Pride costs nothing, yet it is especially precious when it can be “purchased” at someone else’s expense.

Why can’t I remember that not once have I ever seen a coin, whether grimy copper or bright gold, that had but one side.

One has to be at least as ancient as I am now to see that if you try to make sense of life, if you look for patterns and meaning, not only are you bound to be disappointed, you are likely to waste a good deal of precious time.

Children—their untroubled, idyllic vision of the future is almost always shattered. Sooner or later they learn what all youth must—that life is the cruel fate that awaits them while they make plans for a tomorrow that will never be.

Since my arrival in Rome, I have had many opportunities to wonder if compassion’s opposite is cruelty, or to reflect whether or not indifference would serve as a better black to its white.