Disqualified as a human being. I had now ceased utterly to be a human being.

Happiness may be something like gold dust sinking to the bottom of a river of sorrow, faintly glimmering.

Cowards are afraid even of happiness. They get hurt on cotton.

If the cuckoo will not sing, I shall make it want to sing.

-- Toyotomi Hideyoshi

Life is like unto a long journey with a heavy burden. Let thy step be slow and steady, that thou stumble not.

-- Tokugawa Ieyasu

Fifty years of human life -- compared to the realm beneath heaven, it is but a dream, an illusion.

-- Oda Nobunaga

I would rather betray the world than let the world betray me.

-- Cao Cao

For human beings, fate arrives suddenly, without any warning.

-- Yasushi Inoue

In the world of men, there is never only one path. There are always many paths.

-- Mori Ōgai