How is it possible that a being with such sensitive jewels as the eyes, such enchanted musical instruments as the ears, and such fabulous arabesque of nerves as the brain can experience itself anything less than a god.

An intellectual is someone whose mind watches itself.

Thought must be divided against itself before it can come to any knowledge of itself.

There is an optical illusion about every person we meet.

There are as many pillows of illusion as flakes in a snow-storm. We wake from one dream into another dream.

Is pride, the never-failing vice of fools.

We must, all of us, learn actually not to have enemies, but only confused adversaries who are ourselves in disguise.

Sadly, the truth is, there aren’t many people who can be put in high positions who won’t start thinking highly of themselves.

Be at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let every new year find you a better man.

The greatest of faults, I should say, is to be conscious of none.

Our necessities never equal our wants.

We will always tend to fulfill our own expectation of ourselves.

How simple a thing it seems to me that to know ourselves as we are, we must know our mothers names.

What a terrible thing to have lost one’s mind. Or not to have a mind at all. How true that is.

Character is like a tree and reputation like a shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.

I’m a human being. I’ve got opinions, I’m not always right, I’m not always on time, I don’t always say things in the proper way, but my intentions are always extremely pure.

It is more difficult to rule yourself than to rule a city.

The faults of a superior person are like the sun and moon. They have their faults, and everyone sees them; they change and everyone looks up to them.

The greater intellect one has, the more originality one finds in men. Ordinary persons find no difference between men.

We should take care not to make the intellect our goal; it has, of course, powerful muscles, but no personality.

I don’t really get nervous that much, or if I do, only I know. It’s all inside me. I am good at hiding everything.

Do you want to know who you are? Don’t ask. Act! Action will delineate and define you.

The finest works of art are precious, among other reasons, because they make it possible for us to know, if only imperfectly and for a little while, what it actually feels like to think subtly and feel nobly.

Whatever deceives men seems to produce a magical enchantment.

Meditation is not following any system; it is not constant repetition and imitation. Meditation is not concentration.

Thinking is more interesting than knowing, but less interesting than looking.

I remain just one thing, and one thing only, and that is a clown. It places me on a far higher plane than any politician.

I think we have to own the fears that we have of each other, and then, in some practical way, some daily way, figure out how to see people differently than the way we were brought up to.

There’s two sorts of fear: one you embrace and one you should listen to and turn the other way.

I don’t know who I touch and who I don’t. I work hard trying to make people laugh. I try to do the kind of stuff that made me laugh growing up. I don’t have any secrets. I don’t know the reasons I’ve been so well received.

What you are comes to you.

I am not the humblest person in the world. I admit that.

You should never give up your inner self.

The line between failure and success is so fine that we scarcely know when we pass it: so fine that we are often on the line and do not know it.

Man can hardly even recognize the devils of his own creation.

To realize that you do not understand is a virtue; Not to realize that you do not understand is a defect.

No object is so beautiful that, under certain conditions, it will not look ugly.

The eyes of others our prisons; their thoughts our cages.

O wretched man, wretched not just because of what you are, but also because you do not know how wretched you are!

Even the knowledge of my own fallibility cannot keep me from making mistakes. Only when I fall do I get up again.

I’m not very ambitious at all.

People are more aware now of cities and of different ways of life. I suppose the writing I do is a bit in the past, and I’m not sure it’s the kind of writing I would do if I were starting now.

The eye sees what it brings the power to see.

Children astound me with their inquisitive minds. The world is wide and mysterious to them, and as they piece together the puzzle of life, they ask ‚Why?‘ ceaselessly.

I don’t crave applause. I’m not one of those guys who comes alive on stage. I’m much more alive at home, I think.

Love is a state of being.

Sometimes a nickname is used instead of the real name. But a nickname may offend either the one named or the parents who gave the name.

Every thought you produce, anything you say, any action you do, it bears your signature.

You have a nice personality, but not for a human being.

I’m personally more struck by visual things more than musical.

Don’t ever criticize yourself. Don’t go around all day long thinking, ‚I’m unattractive, I’m slow, I’m not as smart as my brother.‘ God wasn’t having a bad day when he made you… If you don’t love yourself in the right way, you can’t love your neighbour. You can’t be as good as you are supposed to be.

How people treat you is their karma; how you react is yours.

I’m trying to keep a level head. You have to be careful out in the world. It’s so easy to get turned.

And obviously, from our own personal point of view, the principal challenge is a personal challenge.

Meditation is to be aware of every thought and of every feeling, never to say it is right or wrong, but just to watch it and move with it. In that watching, you begin to understand the whole movement of thought and feeling. And out of this awareness comes silence.

‚Tis best to weigh the enemy more mighty than he seems.

Cowardice… is almost always simply a lack of ability to suspend functioning of the imagination.

Reactive people… are often affected by their physical environment. They find external sources to blame for their behavior.

I need to keep working on myself for a while.

I don’t have this feeling that 70 is really old.

Within us there is someone who knows everything, wills everything, does everything better than we ourselves.