Our society is run by insane people for insane objectives. I think we’re being run by maniacs for maniacal ends and I think I’m liable to be put away as insane for expressing that. That’s what’s insane about it.

To truly laugh, you must be able to take your pain, and play with it!

Although I don’t have a prescription for what others should do, I know I have been very fortunate and feel a responsibility to give back to society in a very significant way.

No government ought to be without censors; and where the press is free no one ever will.

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

Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is probably the reason why so few engage in it.

It is important to remember yourself.

In Japan, the writers have made up a literary community, a circle, a society. I think 90 percent of Japan’s writers live in Tokyo. Naturally, they make a community. There are groups and customs, and so they are tied up in a way.

Analysis is like a lobotomy. Who wants to have all their edges shaved off?

The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.

Morality arose largely as an empirical defence of the individual and society. Ever since intelligent beings began to be in contact, and consequently in friction, they have felt the need to guard themselves against each other’s encroachments.

A contented mind is the greatest blessing a man can enjoy in this world.

I’m trying to make God more relevant in our society.

There never was and is not likely soon to be a nation of philosophers, nor am I certain it is desirable that there should be.

I really don’t like women who try to be men. All these politicians, I think they’re horrendous. We could have a brilliant future, but we have this terrible male vision of destroying everything. They’d better sort themselves out and become more womanly.

If we do not maintain justice, justice will not maintain us.

A well-instructed people alone can be permanently a free people.

Men who are unhappy, like men who sleep badly, are always proud of the fact.

Any man who reads too much and uses his own brain too little falls into lazy habits of thinking.

Long before history began we men have got together apart from the women and done things. We had time.

Life is grim, and we don’t have to be grim all the time.

Become slower in your journey through life. Practice yoga and meditation if you suffer from ‚hurry sickness.‘ Become more introspective by visiting quiet places such as churches, museums, mountains and lakes. Give yourself permission to read at least one novel a month for pleasure.

I’m perpetually lonely.

All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does. That’s his.

While the rest of the world has been improving technology, Ghana has been improving the quality of man’s humanity to man.

I’m trying to make God more relevant in our society. And I think talking in everyday terms and making sure people can understand it – I think that’s important.

The arts have only ever interested a small minority of people, which acted as a kind of nursery to support artists.

Throughout my years in business, I discovered something. I would always ask why you do things. The answers that I would invariably get are: ‚Oh, that’s just the way things are done around here.‘ Nobody knows why they do what they do. Nobody thinks very deeply about things in business.

There is a natural aristocracy among men. The grounds of this are virtue and talents.

It’s hard to practice compassion when we’re struggling with our authenticity or when our own worthiness is off-balance.

Justice is itself the great standing policy of civil society; and any eminent departure from it, under any circumstances, lies under the suspicion of being no policy at all.

No one can say, ‚I have dropped out – I am no longer in the system.‘ When you’re in prison, you’re even closer to the system: you feel it more, and you might be in there for whatever reason. You don’t transform the system as an absolute thing.

Depression begins with disappointment. When disappointment festers in our soul, it leads to discouragement.

If we examine our thoughts, we shall find them always occupied with the past and the future.

To cut short the question of the law of retaliation, we must note that even in its primitive form it can operate only between two individuals of whom one is absolutely innocent, and the other absolutely guilty. The victim, to be sure, is innocent. But can the society that is supposed to represent the victim lay claim to innocence?

Men have become the tools of their tools.

The purpose of Compulsory Education is to deprive the common people of their commonsense.

There’s no substitute for the practice of meditation.

We live in a world that has narrowed into a neighborhood before it has broadened into a brotherhood.

I think beating myself up sometimes and knowing I am not happy when I do it makes me work harder to do a good job.

Once spirit was God, then it became man, and now it is even becoming mob.

I have been ever of opinion that revolutions are not to be evaded.

Dread, which is closely related to fear, steals the ability to enjoy ordinary life and makes people anxious about the future. It keeps them from looking forward to the next day, the next month, or the next decade.

Science is properly more scrupulous than dogma. Dogma gives a charter to mistake, but the very breath of science is a contest with mistake, and must keep the conscience alive.

We have the resources to build room for a trillion humans in this solar system, and when we have a trillion humans, we’ll have a thousand Einsteins and a thousand Mozarts. It will be a way more interesting place to live.

We live in ugly times.

I truly believe that when the history books are written, our age will be remembered for three things: the war on terror, the digital revolution, and what we did – or did not do – to put the fire out in Africa. History, like God, is watching what we do.

Seek not the favor of the multitude; it is seldom got by honest and lawful means. But seek the testimony of few; and number not voices, but weigh them.

All partisan movements add to the fullness of our understanding of society as a whole. They never detract; or, in any case, one must not allow them to do so. Experience adds to experience.

Since I was 16, I’ve felt a black cloud hangs over me. Since then, I have taken pills for depression.

If workers are more insecure, that’s very ‚healthy‘ for the society, because if workers are insecure, they won’t ask for wages, they won’t go on strike, they won’t call for benefits; they’ll serve the masters gladly and passively. And that’s optimal for corporations‘ economic health.

Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned.

Physical comforts cannot subdue mental suffering, and if we look closely, we can see that those who have many possessions are not necessarily happy. In fact, being wealthy often brings even more anxiety.

I do think coaches need to get away from the game more, though. It’s good for them.

Hatred is self-punishment.

Society has made us believe you should look like an 18-year-old model all your life.

I hesitate to use a pathologizing label, but underneath the so-called narcissistic personality is definitely shame and the paralyzing fear of being ordinary.

Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.

The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.

The number, the industry, and the morality of the priesthood, and the devotion of the people have been manifestly increased by the total separation of the church from the state.

I have never thought it necessary to patronize the American people.