Conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth.

Men are only as good as their technical development allows them to be.

Only our individual faith in freedom can keep us free.

The distinguishing sign of slavery is to have a price, and to be bought for it.

To conclude that women are unfitted to the task of our historic society seems to me the equivalent of closing male eyes to female facts.

It was not a religion that attacked us that September day. It was al-Qaeda. We will not sacrifice the liberties we cherish or hunker down behind walls of suspicion and mistrust.

No greater thing is created suddenly, any more than a bunch of grapes or a fig. If you tell me that you desire a fig, I answer you that there must be time. Let it first blossom, then bear fruit, then ripen.

I’m the type person, my safe place to be emotional is the booth.

I was probably tall as a child, but I just stopped growing.

I’d read up on the history of our country and I’d become fascinated with the story of the Alamo. To me it represented the fight for freedom, not just in America, but in all countries.

If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.

I hope that what you take away from my album is not just the music – which I did want to be fun, and I did want it to be about individuality, but please also take away from it that there’s no dream that’s too big.

I’m not who people expect me to be. I’m not Henry Kissinger.

Man as an individual is a genius. But men in the mass form the headless monster, a great, brutish idiot that goes where prodded.

Everybody will make mistakes, and for some that mistake will rise to the level of being a crime.

We were born with a capacity to grow, love, marry, and form families.

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.

I’m confident in who I am. I’ve come to a place in my life where I’ve accepted things that are me, as opposed to feeling pressure to explain myself to people around me. That’s just the way I’ve always tried to be. It didn’t change when I became a star.

No driver is perfect.

Liberty doesn’t work as well in practice as it does in speeches.

Man, unlike anything organic or inorganic in the universe, grows beyond his work, walks up the stairs of his concepts, emerges ahead of his accomplishments.

And finally I twist my heart round again, so that the bad is on the outside and the good is on the inside, and keep on trying to find a way of becoming what I would so like to be, and could be, if there weren’t any other people living in the world.

A consistent thinker is a thoughtless person, because he conforms to a pattern; he repeats phrases and thinks in a groove.

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

Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood. All is riddle, and the key to a riddle is another riddle.

There are some cases in which the sense of injury breeds not the will to inflict injuries and climb over them as a ladder, but a hatred of all injury.

You learn that there’s no right way to do it, no wrong way to do it. It’s just what you feel comfortable with, to trust that, and don’t let anybody box you in to a certain style of parenting or make you feel a certain way about what your kids do.

Advocates of capitalism are very apt to appeal to the sacred principles of liberty, which are embodied in one maxim: The fortunate must not be restrained in the exercise of tyranny over the unfortunate.

I write for the same reason I breathe – because if I didn’t, I would die.

I write from my soul. This is the reason that critics don’t hurt me, because it is me. If it was not me, if I was pretending to be someone else, then this could unbalance my world, but I know who I am.

I learn poetry, learn text, and that really keeps you alive.

In my research, I’ve interviewed a lot of people who never fit in, who are what you might call ‚different‘: scientists, artists, thinkers. And if you drop down deep into their work and who they are, there is a tremendous amount of self-acceptance.

If you’re too free, you’re like the way Hong Kong is now. It’s very chaotic.

I want the world to see my body.

I try to see the good in everybody, and I don’t care who people are as long as they’re themselves, whatever that is.

Storms make trees take deeper roots.

Nay, be a Columbus to whole new continents and worlds within you, opening new channels, not of trade, but of thought.

There’s something about being in front of a live audience that’s fun. It’s a really interesting, very electric, very alive, and intense experience, and you can’t get it anywhere else. And I’ve been doing it since I was 23, so it’s part of my being – it’s part of my fabric as a person.

Liberty, when it begins to take root, is a plant of rapid growth.

I think we must get rid of slavery, or we must get rid of freedom.

The power of our thoughts may never be measured or appreciated, but it became obvious to me as a young boy that there was value and power in being aware of my thoughts and how I expressed myself.

Not only must we be good, but we must also be good for something.

Learning without thought is labor lost; thought without learning is perilous.

Change is inevitable. Change is constant.

The greater our knowledge increases the more our ignorance unfolds.

Observe constantly that all things take place by change, and accustom thyself to consider that the nature of the Universe loves nothing so much as to change the things which are, and to make new things like them.

I don’t even know how to speak up for myself, because I don’t really have a father who would give me the confidence or advice. And if you’re always the new kid, you never get a chance to adapt, so your confidence is just zilch.

The boisterous sea of liberty is never without a wave.

For to be free is not merely to cast off one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.

My children came out as individuals in their own right. They were not my products. They had their own characters and were very strong-minded. I gave them a lot of freedom when they were still very young. The one thing they got from me is morals. They would never betray anyone. They are really good people.

In this possibly terminal phase of human existence, democracy and freedom are more than just ideals to be valued – they may be essential to survival.

Every man who knows how to read has it in his power to magnify himself, to multiply the ways in which he exists, to make his life full, significant and interesting.

If everything was perfect, you would never learn and you would never grow.

America is known as a country that welcomes people to its shores. All kinds of people. The image of the Statue of Liberty with Emma Lazarus‘ famous poem. She lifts her lamp and welcomes people to the golden shore, where they will not experience prejudice because of the color of their skin, the religious faith that they follow.

I never wanted to stay in one genre; I never wanted to be pigeon-holed or defined as the actor who only worked in one genre. I want to be able to work in all different genres. For me it’s fun, and that’s how I grow as an actor.

Much of your pain is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self.

No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.

Liberty consists in the power of doing that which is permitted by the law.

There will never be a really free and enlightened State until the State comes to recognize the individual as a higher and independent power, from which all its own power and authority are derived, and treats him accordingly.

Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.

Taste is the only morality. Tell me what you like and I’ll tell you what you are.