If you were to ask me to choose between democratic values and wealth, power, prosperity and fame, I will very easily and without any doubt choose democratic values.

When you see something that is technically sweet, you go ahead and do it and you argue about what to do about it only after you have had your technical success. That is the way it was with the atomic bomb.

Well, I think indigenous peoples have ways of living on the Earth that they’ve had forever. And they’ve been overrun by organized religion, which has had a lot of money and power.

I find the difference, for me, between having no money and having quite a bit is that the bills get bigger. And that’s it. The lifestyle doesn’t change.

The best thing is to always keep honest people around, because when you have a bunch of yes men around that know that you’re making a mistake but let you go on with it, that’s when it ruins your mind state as an artist.

Intolerance betrays want of faith in one’s cause.

Reverence for life is the highest court of appeal.

I have plenty of money, unlike other Hollywood celebrities or athletes that have not invested well.

Wealthy men can’t live in an island that is encircled by poverty. We all breathe the same air. We must give a chance to everyone, at least a basic chance.

You are doomed to make choices. This is life’s greatest paradox.

I had therefore to remove knowledge, in order to make room for belief.

Money is better than poverty, if only for financial reasons.

Modesty is the color of virtue.

In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.

I don’t have people following me around, like bodyguards. I don’t know how people live like that. Maybe the young movie stars have to live like that, I don’t know. But it seems a little crazy to me. I don’t think you need all that stuff.

We all want to be famous people, and the moment we want to be something we are no longer free.

Presidents quickly realize that while a single act might destroy the world they live in, no one single decision can make life suddenly better or can turn history around for the good.

It is a strange desire, to seek power, and to lose liberty; or to seek power over others, and to lose power over a man’s self.

We have also arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster. We might get away with it for a while, but sooner or later this combustible mixture of ignorance and power is going to blow up in our faces.

I wanted to use my fame and this face that everyone knows so well to help uplift and inspire people around the world.

Every man, every woman who has to take up the service of government, must ask themselves two questions: ‚Do I love my people in order to serve them better? Am I humble and do I listen to everybody, to diverse opinions in order to choose the best path?‘ If you don’t ask those questions, your governance will not be good.

All things are subject to interpretation whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth.

I can make more generals, but horses cost money.

Even if the politics needed doesn’t exist today, we still need to use our voices to make sure that the people in power are focused on the right things. Because this is a democracy, and in a democracy, people are the ones who run the country.

Riches have never fascinated me, unless combined with the greatest charm or distinction.

What good is it being Marilyn Monroe? Why can’t I just be an ordinary woman?

The power of the white world is threatened whenever a black man refuses to accept the white world’s definitions.

I have made good judgments in the past. I have made good judgments in the future.

There’s a reason why the Foo Fighters don’t blast out Nirvana songs every night: because we have a lot of respect for them. You know, that’s hallowed ground. We have to be careful. We have to tread lightly. We have talked about it before, but the opportunity hasn’t really come up, or it just hasn’t felt right.

For a successful entrepreneur it can mean extreme wealth. But with extreme wealth comes extreme responsibility. And the responsibility for me is to invest in creating new businesses, create jobs, employ people, and to put money aside to tackle issues where we can make a difference.

Where an excess of power prevails, property of no sort is duly respected. No man is safe in his opinions, his person, his faculties, or his possessions.

People want to go out and travel around and meet cool people. I could just go live in Vermont, but is that what I really want?

I definitely don’t think that money can buy you love. It can buy you affection but certainly not love.

I have thought a sufficient measure of civilization is the influence of good women.

A mission statement is not something you write overnight… But fundamentally, your mission statement becomes your constitution, the solid expression of your vision and values. It becomes the criterion by which you measure everything else in your life.

The highly functional infrastructure that surrounds us, particularly in the West, is a gift from our ancestors: the comparatively uncorrupt political and economic systems, the technology, the wealth, the lifespan, the freedom, the luxury, and the opportunity.

Do I wear a helmet? Ugh. I do when I’m riding through a precarious part of town, meaning Midtown traffic. But when I’m riding on secure protected lanes or on the paths that run along the Hudson or through Central Park – no, I don’t wear the dreaded helmet then.

You only have to do a very few things right in your life so long as you don’t do too many things wrong.

I believe God wants you to have money to pay your bills, send your kids to college and do charity work and build orphanages. There’s the teaching that we’re supposed to be poor to show that we’re humble. I don’t buy that. I think we’re supposed to be leaders. We’re supposed to excel.

No man is rich enough to buy back his past.

There are three classes of men; lovers of wisdom, lovers of honor, and lovers of gain.

Concentrated power has always been the enemy of liberty.

I don’t think I would run for president.

Money is the seed of money, and the first guinea is sometimes more difficult to acquire than the second million.

If past history was all there was to the game, the richest people would be librarians.

I carry a small sheet of paper in my wallet that has written on it the names of people whose opinions of me matter. To be on that list, you have to love me for my strengths and struggles.

My parents didn’t want to move to Florida, but they turned sixty and that’s the law.

If I hadn’t given my money away, I’d have had more than anyone else on the planet.

I was not raised with wealth or resources or any social standing to speak of.

One’s philosophy is not best expressed in words; it is expressed in the choices one makes… and the choices we make are ultimately our responsibility.

This land is your land and this land is my land, sure, but the world is run by those that never listen to music anyway.

I think that a president needs to have a variety of views presented. But also, there has to be a team effort, because otherwise, I think it creates a dissonance and difficulty.

Agriculture not only gives riches to a nation, but the only riches she can call her own.

For people who may think they know, or have snippets of who I am, you can attack that person. That’s part of being a public figure.

It has not yet become obvious to me that there’s no real problem. I cannot define the real problem; therefore, I suspect there’s no real problem, but I’m not sure there’s no real problem.

You make more money if you’re generous.

Everything in the world may be endured except continual prosperity.

The point in history at which we stand is full of promise and danger. The world will either move forward toward unity and widely shared prosperity – or it will move apart.

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

In countries where innocent people are dying, the leaders are following their blood rather than their brains.

If we don’t believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don’t believe in it at all.