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.

Truth is the beginning of every good to the gods, and of every good to man.

If thou wilt make a man happy, add not unto his riches but take away from his desires.

To be clever enough to get all that money, one must be stupid enough to want it.

It is not the man who has too little, but the man who craves more, that is poor.

Where love rules, there is no will to power; and where power predominates, there love is lacking. The one is the shadow of the other.

It is more agreeable to have the power to give than to receive.

I’m interested in movement, and I’m interested in money, and I’m interested in the movement of money.

The richest people in the world look for and build networks; everyone else looks for work.

A whole people with the ballot in their hands possess the most conclusive and unlimited power ever entrusted to humanity.

The honest poor can sometimes forget poverty. The honest rich can never forget it.

As fire when thrown into water is cooled down and put out, so also a false accusation when brought against a man of the purest and holiest character, boils over and is at once dissipated, and vanishes and threats of heaven and sea, himself standing unmoved.

If you feel that there’s the author and then the character, then the book is not working. People have a habit of identifying the author with the narrator, and you can’t, obviously, be all of the narrators in all of your books, or else you’d be a very strange person indeed.

The point – the power to hurt – of all figures lies in the truthfulness of their application.

‚Tis best to weigh the enemy more mighty than he seems.

Do you realize the responsibility I carry? I’m the only person standing between Richard Nixon and the White House.

I repeat… that all power is a trust; that we are accountable for its exercise; that from the people and for the people all springs, and all must exist.

Princes and governments are far more dangerous than other elements within society.

For ‚Hercules,‘ I went for the demigod look: big and mean. When you’re playing a character like the son of Zeus, you only get one shot.

Some day science may have the existence of mankind in power, and the human race can commit suicide by blowing up the world.

Probably the greatest harm done by vast wealth is the harm that we of moderate means do ourselves when we let the vices of envy and hatred enter deep into our own natures.

There is no index of character so sure as the voice.

Any of us can be happy and have a good attitude when everything is going our way. But I believe it’s the real test of your character and of your faith to say, ‚Things are not going our way, but I’m still being good to people; I’m still attending church; I still have a good attitude.‘

Those newspapers of the nation which most loudly cried dictatorship against me would have been the first to justify the beginnings of dictatorship by somebody else.

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

I was not raised with wealth or resources or any social standing to speak of.

You make more money if you’re generous.

Money doesn’t talk, it swears.

There is no necessity to separate the monarch from the mob; all authority is equally bad.

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

The spread of civilisation may be likened to a fire; first, a feeble spark, next a flickering flame, then a mighty blaze, ever increasing in speed and power.

I only wish that ordinary people had an unlimited capacity for doing harm; then they might have an unlimited power for doing good.

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.

Conscientious people are apt to see their duty in that which is the most painful course.

The fragrance of flowers spreads only in the direction of the wind. But the goodness of a person spreads in all directions.

A real gentleman, even if he loses everything he owns, must show no emotion. Money must be so far beneath a gentleman that it is hardly worth troubling about.

Money has no utility to me beyond a certain point.

It is the flash which appears, the thunderbolt will follow.

What then do you call your soul? What idea have you of it? You cannot of yourselves, without revelation, admit the existence within you of anything but a power unknown to you of feeling and thinking.

Power is the measure of the degree of control you have over circumstances in your life and the actions of the people around you. It is a skill that is developed by a deep understanding of human nature, of what truly motivates people, and of the manipulations necessary for advancement and protection.

You want to play another kind of character in another genre, and it’s been something I’ve been trying to do if I can in the career so far, and it’s something I hope to continue because it’s interesting to me and you get to do different things as an actor.

But the relationship of morality and power is a very subtle one. Because ultimately power without morality is no longer power.

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

Getting rich is about fun. It’s a game, and you have to treat it that way.

If you were to ask me to choose between democratic values and wealth, power, prosperity and fame, I will very easily and without any doubt choose democratic values.

Great is the hand that holds dominion over man by a scribbled name.

My name is Adam Sandler. I’m not particularly talented. I’m not particularly good-looking. And yet I’m a multi-millionaire.

Character is always known. Thefts never enrich; alms never impoverish; murder will speak out of stone walls.

The highest use of capital is not to make more money, but to make money do more for the betterment of life.

The 21st century is going to be the American century. Because we lead not only by the example of our power, but by the power of our example. That is the history of the journey of America.

Don’t matter how much money you got, there’s only two kinds of people: there’s saved people and there’s lost people.

The superior man does not, even for the space of a single meal, act contrary to virtue. In moments of haste, he cleaves to it. In seasons of danger, he cleaves to it.

Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up, and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable – a most sacred right – a right, which we hope and believe, is to liberate the world.

I often say of George Washington that he was one of the few in the whole history of the world who was not carried away by power.

When you give everyone a voice and give people power, the system usually ends up in a really good place. So, what we view our role as, is giving people that power.

Let me smile with the wise, and feed with the rich.

I loved being Maleficent. I was quite sad to put my staff down and put my horns away because somehow, she just lives in a different world.

No man who has once heartily and wholly laughed can be altogether irreclaimably bad.

Few enterprises of great labor or hazard would be undertaken if we had not the power of magnifying the advantages we expect from them.

Be careful to leave your sons well instructed rather than rich, for the hopes of the instructed are better than the wealth of the ignorant.

The roots of all goodness lie in the soil of appreciation for goodness.