Write down the thoughts of the moment. Those that come unsought for are commonly the most valuable.

It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live.

No man means all he says, and yet very few say all they mean, for words are slippery and thought is viscous.

O! for a muse of fire, that would ascend the brightest heaven of invention.

The way to know life is to love many things.

For most of us, wisdom is acquired in the thicket of experience and usually meets us somewhere along the way if we live long enough. But sooner is better than later.

There are two ways of exerting one’s strength: one is pushing down, the other is pulling up.

It’s lack that gives us inspiration. It’s not fullness.

Nothing can come of nothing.

When I have a terrible need of – shall I say the word – religion. Then I go out and paint the stars.

Practically everybody in New York has half a mind to write a book, and does.

The only way to discover the limits of the possible is to go beyond them into the impossible.

Art is never finished, only abandoned.

Growing old has been the greatest surprise of my life.

Imagination is a poor matter when it has to part company with understanding.

Thoughts are mental energy; they’re the currency that you have to attract what you desire. Learn to stop spending that currency on thoughts you don’t want.

I made my fair share of mistakes.

Hitch your wagon to a star.

I seated ugliness on my knee, and almost immediately grew tired of it.

My entire childhood was steeped in poverty. For me, poverty, in a way, was the first inspiration of my life, a commitment to do something for the poor.

In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.

The idea that is not dangerous is not worthy of being called an idea at all.

Some people seem to fade away but then when they are truly gone, it’s like they didn’t fade away at all.

We based the look on rock ‚n roll right from the beginning.

Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.

Hope is the magic carpet that transports us from the present moment into the realm of infinite possibilities.

The road to perdition has ever been accompanied by lip service to an ideal.

Most people dream a dream when they are asleep. But to be a writer, you have to dream while you are awake, intentionally. So I get up early in the morning, 4 o’clock, and I sit at my desk and what I do is just dream. After three or four hours, that’s enough. In the afternoon, I run. The next day, the dream will continue.

Old age is just a record of one’s whole life.

Every one goes astray, but the least imprudent are they who repent the soonest.

Wisely, and slow. They stumble that run fast.

In art, at a certain level, there is no ‚better than.‘ It’s just about trying to operate for yourself on the most supreme level, artistically, that you can and hoping that people get it. Trusting that, just because of the way people are built and how interconnected we are, greatness will translate and symmetry will be recognised.

It is, generally, in the season of prosperity that men discover their real temper, principles, and designs.

When you’re around me and really see that all I do is live and breathe for my work, it’s not strange, it’s just Gaga.

The job of art is to chase ugliness away.

Don’t ever take a fence down until you know why it was put up.

Why do I like to write short stories? Well, I certainly didn’t intend to. I was going to write a novel. And still! I still come up with ideas for novels. And I even start novels. But something happens to them. They break up. I look at what I really want to do with the material, and it never turns out to be a novel.

I like George Carlin’s jokes. I like his humor. He’s one of my heroes, and I like what he did with talking about everyday things.

Adversity is the diamond dust Heaven polishes its jewels with.

My father considered a walk among the mountains as the equivalent of churchgoing.

When you draw or paint a tree, you do not imitate the tree; you do not copy it exactly as it is, which would be mere photography. To be free to paint a tree or a flower or a sunset, you have to feel what it conveys to you: the significance, the meaning of it.

What a waste it is to lose one’s mind. Or not to have a mind is being very wasteful. How true that is.

Only when the tide goes out do you discover who’s been swimming naked.

It is true that going out on to the street implies the risk of accidents happening, as they would to any ordinary man or woman. But if the church stays wrapped up in itself, it will age. And if I had to choose between a wounded church that goes out on to the streets and a sick, withdrawn church, I would definitely choose the first one.

The bravest person I’ve ever met was a young boy going through massive amounts of treatment for a very rare, complex and unpleasant disease. I last saw him at a Discworld convention, where he chose to take part in a game as an assassin. He died not long afterwards, and I wish I had his fortitude and sense of style.

I remember being in Japan when Destiny’s Child put out ‚Independent Women,‘ and women there were saying how proud they were to have their own jobs, their own independent thinking, their own goals. It made me feel so good, and I realized that one of my responsibilities was to inspire women in a deeper way.

Sometimes, if you begin to sing in a halfhearted mood, you can sing yourself up the ladder. Singing will often make the heart rise.

You see, you are a spirit, you have a soul, and you live in a body. You have emotions, you have thoughts, you have a will, and you have a conscience. You are a complex being! And Jesus came to heal every single part of you. There’s not one part that He doesn’t want to make completely whole.

Happy, happy Christmas, that can win us back to the delusions of our childhood days, recall to the old man the pleasures of his youth, and transport the traveler back to his own fireside and quiet home!

People don’t care about what someone says about you in a movie – or even what you say, right? They care about what you build. And if you can make something that makes people’s life better, then that’s something that’s really good.

To read without reflecting is like eating without digesting.

First and last, what is demanded of genius is love of truth.

Does wisdom perhaps appear on the earth as a raven which is inspired by the smell of carrion?

Civil disobedience’s main goal typically is to try to arouse and inspire others to join and do something. Well, sometimes that is a good tactic, sometimes not.

People have to go through trials and tribulations to get where they at. Do your thing – continue to rock it – because obviously, God wants you here.

A word after a word after a word is power.

I’ve had two cancer bouts in my years on the Court, and the first one, Justice O’Connor told me, ‚Now, you do the chemotherapy on Friday because you’ll get over it during the weekend and you can be back in court on Monday.‘

But men must know, that in this theatre of man’s life it is reserved only for God and angels to be lookers on.

It is a curious thing: man, the centre and creator of all science, is the only object which our science has not yet succeeded in including in a homogeneous representation of the universe. We know the history of his bones, but no ordered place has yet been found in nature for his reflective intelligence.

Sometimes our light goes out but is blown into flame by another human being. Each of us owes deepest thanks to those who have rekindled this light.

I don’t want to be too critical of what other people do, but when people go back to do the same thing that they did, I’m completely confused. I’m like, ‚Didn’t you make that movie already?‘ I’ve been very fortunate, and I’m well taken care of, so the least I can do is try to go forward.