Getting old is a fascination thing. The older you get, the older you want to get.

The aim of the wise is not to secure pleasure, but to avoid pain.

Every time I think that I’m getting old, and gradually going to the grave, something else happens.

I have quite a decent constitution in spite of all my abuse of it and my advanced years. I’m still quite robust.

I can never say ‚why‘ about anything I do. I suppose I can say ‚how‘ and ‚when‘ and ‚what.‘ But ‚why‘ is impenetrable to me.

I think my vice would be outdoing myself.

An eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind.

Mediocrity can talk, but it is for genius to observe.

I always pass on good advice. It is the only thing to do with it. It is never of any use to oneself.

The superior man understands what is right; the inferior man understands what will sell.

There is a piece of me that likes to fondly imagine my maverick and rebellious nature. But, more accurately, I like to have a nice and cosy institution that I can rub up against a little bit.

He who has so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by changing anything but his own disposition will waste his life in fruitless efforts.

A lot of truth is said in jest.

Nothing in the affairs of men is worthy of great anxiety.

Create a ladder of values and priorities in your life, reminding yourself of what really matters to you.

As long as you live, keep learning how to live.

We are all sentenced to solitary confinement inside our own skins, for life.

All that is gold does not glitter, not all those who wander are lost; the old that is strong does not wither, deep roots are not reached by the frost.

When we are born we cry that we are come to this great stage of fools.

A clever man commits no minor blunders.

Gain may be temporary and uncertain; but ever while you live, expense is constant and certain: and it is easier to build two chimneys than to keep one in fuel.

I am not the humblest person in the world. I admit that.

To know oneself is to study oneself in action with another person.

I know love is the answer.

For years I wanted to be older, and now I am.

Adversity leads us to think properly of our state, and so is most beneficial to us.

No man can reveal to you nothing but that which already lies half-asleep in the dawning of your knowledge.

We should all be obliged to appear before a board every five years and justify our existence… on pain of liquidation.

Without stirring abroad, One can know the whole world; Without looking out of the window One can see the way of heaven. The further one goes The less one knows.

I sometimes have a tendency to walk on the dark side.

As I get older, I tend to put more into family than I used to.

I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them never happened.

Age doesn’t bother me. So many of my heroes were older guys. It’s the lack of years left that weighs far heavier on me than the age that I am.

Sometimes, indeed, there is such a discrepancy between the genius and his human qualities that one has to ask oneself whether a little less talent might not have been better.

No man can taste the fruits of autumn while he is delighting his scent with the flowers of spring.

It is impossible to live a pleasant life without living wisely and well and justly. And it is impossible to live wisely and well and justly without living a pleasant life.

Many a man thinks he is patient when, in reality, he is indifferent.

The man who makes everything that leads to happiness depends upon himself, and not upon other men, has adopted the very best plan for living happily. This is the man of moderation, the man of manly character and of wisdom.

Clearly older women and especially older women who have led an active life or elder women who successfully maneuver through their own family life have so much to teach us about sharing, patience, and wisdom.

The teacher is the one who gets the most out of the lessons, and the true teacher is the learner.

The wit knows that his place is at the tail of a procession.

I don’t see the point of doing an interview unless you’re going to share the things you learn in life and the mistakes you make. So to admit that I’m extremely human and have done some dark things I don’t think makes me unusual or unusually dark. I think it actually is the right thing to do, and I’d like to think it’s the nice thing to do.

Solitude is independence.

Prime time for men is, say, 35 to 45. Then they level off and fall off.

Where there is reverence there is fear, but there is not reverence everywhere that there is fear, because fear presumably has a wider extension than reverence.

I definitely connected to the fact that life gets out of control and you end up doing things and wishing you were doing other things instead.

It is better, of course, to know useless things than to know nothing.

I really have no interest in myself.

I accept chaos, I’m not sure whether it accepts me.

If I read a book that impresses me, I have to take myself firmly by the hand, before I mix with other people; otherwise they would think my mind rather queer.

The self is hateful.

The wise are wise only because they love. The fool are fools only because they think they can understand love.

After many years of great mercy, after tasting of the powers of the world to come, we still are so weak, so foolish; but, oh! when we get away from self to God, there all is truth and purity and holiness, and our heart finds peace, wisdom, completeness, delight, joy, victory.

It’s not to much fun to know yourself too well or think you do – everyone needs a little conceit to carry them through & past the falls.

Take a chance! All life is a chance. The man who goes farthest is generally the one who is willing to do and dare.

We cannot despair of humanity, since we ourselves are human beings.

The truth. It is a beautiful and terrible thing, and must therefore be treated with great caution.

It would be my guess that Madonna is not a very happy woman. From my own experience, having gone through persona changes like that, that kind of clawing need to be the center of attention is not a pleasant place to be.

It’s normal for human beings to identify with their own separate self. The problem is that we get caught in that notion of ourself as a separate individual and caught in that individual self’s agenda.

The well bred contradict other people. The wise contradict themselves.

‚Tis education forms the common mind; just as the twig is bent the tree’s inclined.