Quotes from Graham Greene

Phuong had kept us a table at the edge of the dance-floor and the orchestra was playing some tune which had been popular in Paris five years ago. Two Vietnamese couples were dancing, small, neat, aloof, with an air of civilization we couldn't match. (I recognized one, an accountant from the Banque de

It is only if the murderer is a good man that he can be regarded as monstrous.

Not many men can have been so loved or have been forgiven so much [...]

I had to touch you with my hands, I had to taste you with my tongue; one can't love and do nothing.

Lust is not the worst thing. It is because any day, any time, lust may turn into love that we have to avoid it. And when we love our sin then we are damned indeed.

In our hearts there is a ruthless dictator, ready to contemplate the misery of a thousand strangers if it will ensure the happiness of the few we love.

You cannot love without intuition.

And when we love our sin then we are damned indeed.

It was as though our love were a small creature caught in a trap and bleeding to death: I had to shut my eyes and wring its neck.

one gets so hopelessly tired of deception.

Hatred seems to operate on the same glands as love; it even produces the same actions. If we had not been taught how to interpret the story of the Passion, would we have been able to say from their actions alone whether it was the jealous Judas or the cowardly Peter who loved Christ?

Communists have committed great crimes, but at least they have not stood aside, like an established society, and been indifferent. I would rather have blood on my hands than water, like Pilate.