Here's a news flash: No soldier gives his life. That's not the way it works. Most soldiers who make a conscious decision to place themselves in harm's way do it to protect their buddies. They do it because of the bonds of friendship - and it goes so much deeper than friendship.

And though my Lord hath lost his estate and been banished out of his country yet neither despised poverty nor pinching necessity could make him break the bonds of friendship or weaken his loyal duty.

Often the magical elements in my books are standing in for elements of the real world the small and magical-in-their-own-right sorts of things that we take for granted and no longer pay attention to like the bonds of friendship that entwine our own lives with those of other people and places.

I don't want euro bonds that serve to mutualize the entire debt of the countries in the euro zone. That can only work in the longer-term. I want euro bonds to be used to finance targeted investments in future-oriented growth projects. It isn't the same thing. Let's call them 'project bonds' instead of euro bonds.

Greece's European neighbors were able step in and bolster the weak foundation on which Greece's free-spending budget was based. It would be difficult for any country or intergovernmental organization to rescue an economy the size of the U.S. if investors were ever to lose faith in our bonds because of our enormous debt.

In thinking about religion and society in the 21st century we should broaden the conversation about faith from doctrinal debates to the larger question of how it might inspire us to strengthen the bonds of belonging that redeem us from our solitude helping us to construct together a gracious and generous social order.

In my experience it is rarer to find a really happy person in a circle of millionaires than among vagabonds.

The bonds of matrimony are like any other bonds - they mature slowly.

What I needed most was to love and to be loved eager to be caught. Happily I wrapped those painful bonds around me and sure enough I would be lashed with the red-hot pokers or jealousy by suspicions and fear by burst of anger and quarrels.