Great ambition is the passion of a great character. Those endowed with it may perform very good or very bad acts. All depends on the principles which direct them.

What we have to do, what at any rate it is our duty to do, is to revive the old art of Lying.

I just usually go with my own taste. If I like something, and it happens to be against the law, well, then I might have a problem.

When you are fitted in a racing car and you race to win, second or third place is not enough.

George Washington, as a boy, was ignorant of the commonest accomplishments of youth. He could not even lie.

Thirty-three-years-old, still creating art. It’s rage, it’s creativity, it’s pain, it’s hurt, but it’s the opportunity to still have my voice get out there through music.

So many people have this idea: I want to achieve something great or be somebody great. And they neglect the step that leads to greatness. They don’t honor this step at this moment because they have this idea of some future moment where they are going to be great.

I was always interested in French poetry sort of as a sideline to my own work, I was translating contemporary French poets. That kind of spilled out into translation as a way to earn money, pay for food and put bread on the table.

The universe is not required to be in perfect harmony with human ambition.

If this were all to go away tomorrow, all the big success, I would still be very happy going from bar to bar playing music for people.

In the world today many people rightfully feel entitled to have success and the good things in life, but they usually understand it will require sacrifice and hard work.

So act that your principle of action might safely be made a law for the whole world.

Passion rebuilds the world for the youth. It makes all things alive and significant.

Often, in the real world, it’s not the smart that get ahead but the bold.

I think big business is a terrible thing for the spirit of the country, as our spirit is the best thing about us.

You don’t come into cooking to get rich.

Faced with what is right, to leave it undone shows a lack of courage.

Because my career is so important, I think I make a lot of – I wouldn’t call them sacrifices, but just concessions for my job. I love what I do, and I want to do it for a long time.

Not always actions show the man; we find who does a kindness is not therefore kind.

I had no idea of the character. But the moment I was dressed, the clothes and the make-up made me feel the person he was. I began to know him, and by the time I walked onto the stage he was fully born.

As for me, prizes are nothing. My prize is my work.

Action seems to follow feeling, but really action and feeling go together; and by regulating the action, which is under the more direct control of the will, we can indirectly regulate the feeling, which is not.

I like pushing boundaries.

If I could, I would not do anything else. I’d just be in the studio for my whole life. I would never go to parties, events, and red carpets. I would rather just be in the studio for the whole time. I don’t even care. Nobody has to know what I look like. I just want to make music.

I think it matters whether someone has a good heart.

The strength of a man’s virtue should not be measured by his special exertions, but by his habitual acts.

It’s stasis that kills you off in the end, not ambition.

There is no principle worth the name if it is not wholly good.

Ambition can creep as well as soar.

He has committed the crime who profits by it.

The McLaren prizes can only help me in my quest to ultimately reach Formula One.

Is science of any value? I think a power to do something is of value. Whether the result is a good thing or a bad thing depends on how it is used, but the power is a value.

Persistence is to the character of man as carbon is to steel.

I find a lot of inspiration through visuals. When I was 12, I saw Aurora’s ‚Runaway‘ music video. Something inside me clicked, like, ‚That is what I want to do, no matter whether it goes anywhere or not.‘

What keeps me motivated is love and passion.

Immense power is acquired by assuring yourself in your secret reveries that you were born to control affairs.

The greatness of a man is not in how much wealth he acquires, but in his integrity and his ability to affect those around him positively.

The best football is always about expression of emotion. Always.

Love. Fall in love and stay in love. Write only what you love, and love what you write. The key word is love. You have to get up in the morning and write something you love, something to live for.

Our strategic dialogue with China can both protect American interests and uphold our principles, provided we are honest about our differences on human rights and other issues and provided we use a mix of targeted incentives and sanctions to narrow these differences.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the ambition of the great painters was to make paintings that were like music, which was then considered as the noblest art.

In my view, the only thing worse than a rock star is a rock star with a conscience.

Compassion is the basis of morality.

I know that I always wanted things. I was always proud of my people, proud of my home, but I always wanted more. I think most people do.

Those who commit injustice bear the greatest burden.

While on top of Everest, I looked across the valley towards the great peak Makalu and mentally worked out a route about how it could be climbed. It showed me that even though I was standing on top of the world, it wasn’t the end of everything. I was still looking beyond to other interesting challenges.

Morality is the basis of things and truth is the substance of all morality.

Character is destiny.

Virtue cannot separate itself from reality without becoming a principle of evil.

My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor, and some style.

The U.S. – the idea that the U.S. has introduced and imposed principles of international law, that’s hardly even a joke. The United States has even gone so far as to veto Security Council resolutions calling on all states to observe international law. That was in the 1980s under Reagan.

Howard Zinn was magical as a teacher. Witty, irreverent, and wise, he loved what he was teaching and clearly wanted his students to love it, also.

The humanists‘ replacement for religion: work really hard and somehow you’ll either save yourself or you’ll be immortal. Of course, that’s a total joke, and our progress is nothing. There may be progress in technology but there’s no ethical progress whatsoever.

Virtue itself scapes not calumnious strokes.

Human greatness does not lie in wealth or power, but in character and goodness. People are just people, and all people have faults and shortcomings, but all of us are born with a basic goodness.

To be is to do.

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction.

A lot of people like to do certain things, but they’re not that good at it. Keep going through the things that you like to do, until you find something that you actually seem to be extremely good at. It can be anything.

Places I’ve lived since then had to have some kind of uniqueness and character about them. And logically Key West, and then Down Island. So, all of that stuff sort of had it’s roots in New Orleans and went crazy.

Kings are not born: they are made by artificial hallucination.

The best augury of a man’s success in his profession is that he thinks it the finest in the world.