A retentive memory may be a good thing, but the ability to forget is the true token of greatness.

Right now I’m having amnesia and deja vu at the same time… I think I’ve forgotten this before.

Memory… is the diary that we all carry about with us.

The superior man is distressed by the limitations of his ability; he is not distressed by the fact that men do not recognize the ability that he has.

The true art of memory is the art of attention.

I don’t see how people are comfortable with seeing other people be great. You can be happy for anybody, but what is your excuse to not want to be great? These people are great because they just say, ‚I’ma do that,‘ and they do it. That’s it. There’s no scientifical process.

It is a grand mistake to think of being great without goodness and I pronounce it as certain that there was never a truly great man that was not at the same time truly virtuous.

I do sometimes look back at things I’ve written in the past, and think, ‚I just don’t remember being the person who wrote that.‘

Every time I hear a politician mention the word ‚stimulus,‘ my mind flashes back to high school biology class, when I touched battery wires to a dead frog to make it twitch.

History shows that the majority of people that have done anything great have passed their youth in seclusion.

I remember when the candle shop burned down. Everyone stood around singing ‚Happy Birthday.‘

I have total recall. I remember being born. I remember being in the womb, I remember being inside. Coming out was great.

It is the sign of a great mind to dislike greatness, and to prefer things in measure to things in excess.

Yesterday is but today’s memory, and tomorrow is today’s dream.

If you wish to forget anything on the spot, make a note that this thing is to be remembered.

Never forget that no military leader has ever become great without audacity.

All difficult things have their origin in that which is easy, and great things in that which is small.

Great and good are seldom the same man.

The incomparable greatness of the religions of the East lies in their having been second to none in vibrating with the passion for unity. This note, which is essential to every form of mysticism, has even penetrated them so deeply that we find ourselves falling under a spell simply by uttering the names of their Gods.

Small minds are concerned with the extraordinary, great minds with the ordinary.

How we experience memory sometimes, it’s not linear. We’re not telling the stories to ourselves. We know the story; we’re just seeing it in flashes overlaid.

I do not, in fact, use many puns. Certainly there are far fewer than people believe. But I suspect the ones I do occasionally use tend to hang around in people’s memories for a while.

For me, I don’t want to cheat the game by saying, or kind of doing lip service by saying, I want to be the greatest ever. I want to be able to show it.

When you feel like it’s too hard to obey God, remember that He will never tell you to do something without giving you the grace, power and ability to do it.

No amount of ability is of the slightest avail without honor.

The memory of that scene for me is like a frame of film forever frozen at that moment: the red carpet, the green lawn, the white house, the leaden sky. The new president and his first lady.

When the party gives me a responsibility, I must do it with complete dedication. God has given me the ability, which I utilise to its optimum.

Alas! how little does the memory of these human inhabitants enhance the beauty of the landscape!

It is sadder to find the past again and find it inadequate to the present than it is to have it elude you and remain forever a harmonious conception of memory.

If in the twilight of memory we should meet once more, we shall speak again together and you shall sing to me a deeper song.

I have an excellent memory, a most excellent memory.

Martyrdom: The only way a man can become famous without ability.

If you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything.

Just do what must be done. This may not be happiness, but it is greatness.

It is true greatness to have in one the frailty of a man and the security of a god.

The greatest gift is the ability to forget – to forget the bad things and focus on the good.

I only see clearly what I remember.

It is a rough road that leads to the heights of greatness.

To make America the greatest is my goal, so I beat the Russian and I beat the Pole. And for the U.S.A. won the medal of gold. The Greeks said, ‚You’re better than the Cassius of old.‘

The difference between false memories and true ones is the same as for jewels: it is always the false ones that look the most real, the most brilliant.

Every man’s memory is his private literature.

Man is only great when he acts from passion.

I remember at the age of five travelling on a trolley car with my mother past a group of women on a picket line at a textile plant, seeing them being viciously beaten by security people. So that kind of thing stayed with me.

A clear conscience is usually the sign of a bad memory.

To vilify a great man is the readiest way in which a little man can himself attain greatness.

Who questions much, shall learn much, and retain much.

Poverty is a veil that obscures the face of greatness. An appeal is a mask covering the face of tribulation.

I remember very little about writing the first series of ‚Hitchhiker’s.‘ It’s almost as if someone else wrote it.

Man’s greatness lies in his power of thought.

I’m not the greatest; I’m the double greatest. Not only do I knock ‚em out, I pick the round.

Men are only as great as they are kind.

Maybe I should say that memory interests me a great deal, because I think we all tell stories of our lives to ourselves as well as to other people. Well, women do, anyway. Women do this a lot. And I think when men get older, they do this too, but maybe in slightly different terms.

Anyone who conducts an argument by appealing to authority is not using his intelligence; he is just using his memory.

No human being, however great, or powerful, was ever so free as a fish.

I met Howard Zinn in 1961, my first year at Spelman College in Atlanta. He was the tall, rangy, good-looking professor that many of the girls at Spelman swooned over.

These are not dark days: these are great days – the greatest days our country has ever lived.

One sees great things from the valley; only small things from the peak.

Trust men and they will be true to you; treat them greatly and they will show themselves great.

Voters quickly forget what a man says.

I believe that every one of us has a gift. And I believe that mine is the ability to take the complex and make it simple.

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.