Funny thing is that the poorer people are, the more generous they seem to be.

If we choose, we can live in a world of comforting illusion.

I’m generous. I give good tips. It’s just – the way I live my life, ironically enough, is: I don’t want anything. I’m not a consumer. I don’t crave objects.

The generous Critic fann’d the Poet’s fire, And taught the world with reason to admire.

Everybody has their thing they like or don’t like to see. It’s all in your head. That’s why people take their own pictures, because it’s difficult for someone else to capture what you seek.

People tried to change my concept of what music is. That music is work, but it’s not like that.

The only big things I’ve purchased are my dad’s heart valve and a Rolls-Royce for my parents, for their anniversary. And that was only because my dad had a Lady Gaga license plate on our old car and it was making me crazy because he was getting followed everywhere, so I bought him a new car.

How people themselves perceive what they are doing is not a question that interests me.

In my opinion, there is no aspect of reality beyond the reach of the human mind.

Sometimes I wonder if I’m as famous for my wheelchair and disabilities as I am for my discoveries.

I feel like everything we do comes down to how it looks. Even no branding is branding. For example, you had no face or image to put to my music at first. That was branding.

Some people think luxury is the opposite of poverty. It is not. It is the opposite of vulgarity.

It’s only I have seen enough of it and the funny thing is now, I know that I’m skinny, because I know there are even smaller clothes in the store. I think I’m big, when I was big, I never thought about it.

The human being is in the most literal sense a political animal, not merely a gregarious animal, but an animal which can individuate itself only in the midst of society.

If God dropped acid, would he see people?

I hate the way they portray us in the media. If you see a black family it says they’re looting, if you see a white family it says they’re looking for food.

To practice five things under all circumstances constitutes perfect virtue; these five are gravity, generosity of soul, sincerity, earnestness, and kindness.

We never fully grasp the import of any true statement until we have a clear notion of what the opposite untrue statement would be.

Genius… means little more than the faculty of perceiving in an unhabitual way.

There is a difference between happiness and wisdom: he that thinks himself the happiest man is really so; but he that thinks himself the wisest is generally the greatest fool.

I don’t mind making jokes, but I don’t want to look like one.

The greater intellect one has, the more originality one finds in men. Ordinary persons find no difference between men.

Generosity is nothing else than a craze to possess. All which I abandon, all which I give, I enjoy in a higher manner through the fact that I give it away. To give is to enjoy possessively the object which one gives.

I get to hear the really good or the really bad things in the press, but I don’t read it. I can afford to say that because public opinion does not drive U2’s audience.

To know yet to think that one does not know is best; Not to know yet to think that one knows will lead to difficulty.

The only wealth which you will keep forever is the wealth you have given away.

If I close my eyes and think of Hollywood, all I see is one big varicose vein.

Sure I believe in God and the Devil, but they don’t have to have pitchforks and a long white beard.

What if everything is an illusion and nothing exists? In that case, I definitely overpaid for my carpet.

We must always think about things, and we must think about things as they are, not as they are said to be.

Lo! The poor Indian, whose untutored mind sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind.

I have to be seen to be believed.

There’s a world of difference between truth and facts. Facts can obscure the truth.

I think women go crazy for a reason. It’s not like it just happens.

Nothing that you have not given away will ever be really yours.

Every country is like a particular type of person. America is like a belligerent, adolescent boy; Canada is like an intelligent, 35-year-old woman. Australia is like Jack Nicholson. It comes right up to you and laughs very hard in your face in a highly threatening and engaging manner.

Judgements prevent us from seeing the good that lies beyond appearances.

Men in general are quick to believe that which they wish to be true.

We misjudge risk if we feel we have some control over it, even if it’s an illusory sense of control.

O wise man! Give your wealth only to the worthy and never to others. The water of the sea received by the clouds is always sweet.

It all depends on how we look at things, and not how they are in themselves.

How can you prove whether at this moment we are sleeping, and all our thoughts are a dream; or whether we are awake, and talking to one another in the waking state?

It is only at the first encounter that a face makes its full impression on us.

The little man is still a man.

To understand Europe, you have to be a genius – or French.

People who say they don’t care what people think are usually desperate to have people think they don’t care what people think.

Few are those who see with their own eyes and feel with their own hearts.

There was the time I bought three cars in the span of three or four weeks. It was crazy; it wasn’t greedy. It was mine, my girl’s, my mom’s. I got Benzes for my ladies. But I felt crazy. You have to understand I come from a world where we’re very modest. But that’s not greedy. That’s nice, right?

The light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us. Only that day dawns to which we are awake. There is more day to dawn. The sun is but a morning star.

I only see clearly what I remember.

Men willingly believe what they wish.

Ninety percent of the politicians give the other ten percent a bad reputation.

Why does the eye see a thing more clearly in dreams than the imagination when awake?

Most people would rather give than get affection.

Glance into the world just as though time were gone: and everything crooked will become straight to you.

There is a road from the eye to heart that does not go through the intellect.

I would impress upon your minds the fact that if you want to do a man justice, you should believe what a man says himself rather than what people say he says.

You give before you get.

All art is at once surface and symbol. Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. Those who read the symbol do so at their peril. It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors. Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work is new, complex and vital.

You make more money if you’re generous.

Faith indeed tells what the senses do not tell, but not the contrary of what they see. It is above them and not contrary to them.