If thy brother wrongs thee, remember not so much his wrong-doing, but more than ever that he is thy brother.

We may have our private opinions but why should they be a bar to the meeting of hearts?

I’ve learned that usually, the less I know about other people, the better off I am.

To love someone means to see him as God intended him.

I believe in the spirit of equality and the spirit of this country as one of love and compassion and kindness.

I was very worried about my mother, growing up – a lot. I do not want my children to be worried about me.

I’m convinced of this: Good done anywhere is good done everywhere. For a change, start by speaking to people rather than walking by them like they’re stones that don’t matter. As long as you’re breathing, it’s never too late to do some good.

The unforgivable crime is soft hitting. Do not hit at all if it can be avoided; but never hit softly.

A friend should be a master at guessing and keeping still: you must not want to see everything.

If I love you, what business is it of yours?

My father wasn’t a cruel man. And I loved him. But he was a pretty tough character. His own father was even tougher – one of those Victorians, hard as iron – but my dad was tough enough.

Reading, solitude, idleness, a soft and sedentary life, intercourse with women and young people, these are perilous paths for a young man, and these lead him constantly into danger.

Part of our tradition as black women is that we are universalists. Black children, yellow children, red children, brown children, that is the black woman’s normal, day-to-day relationship. In my family alone, we are about four different colors.

I don’t really know that much about love, it turns out.

When marrying, ask yourself this question: Do you believe that you will be able to converse well with this person into your old age? Everything else in marriage is transitory.

If you would judge, understand.

For a tear is quickly dried, especially when shed for the misfortunes of others.

My mom and my dad were both very sociable, meeting lots of interesting people.

There are two kinds of people in this world. ‚I‘ people and ‚we‘ people. I’ve always tried to be a ‚we‘ person.

If you can, help others; if you cannot do that, at least do not harm them.

It is best to love wisely, no doubt; but to love foolishly is better than not to be able to love at all.

One has children in the expectation of dying before them. In fact, you want to make damn sure you die before them, just as you plant a tree or build a house knowing, hoping that it will outlive you. That’s how the human species has done as well as it has.

Talk well of the absent whenever you have the opportunity.

My parents were both born in Virginia, of undistinguished families – second families, perhaps I should say.

Making your dad happy is – especially for an Italian Catholic girl, I’ll tell you – it feels really good.

A friend is one soul abiding in two bodies.

The great thing about having a bunch of kids is they just remind you that you’re the person who takes them to go poop!

I don’t travel with them, but they can’t be missing in my home. There have to always be dominoes… I used to play with my family – dad, my grandpa, my uncles.

The way you see people is the way you treat them, and the way you treat them is what they become.

I’m entirely interested in people, and also other creatures and beings, but especially in people, and I tend to read them by emotional field more than anything. So I have a special interest in what they’re thinking and who they are and who’s hiding behind those eyes and how did he get there, and what’s the story, really?

From caring comes courage.

When you show deep empathy toward others, their defensive energy goes down, and positive energy replaces it. That’s when you can get more creative in solving problems.

To be intimate with a married man, when my own father cheated on my mother, is not something I could forgive. I could not look at myself in the morning if I did that. I wouldn’t be attracted to a man who would cheat on his wife.

The best way to cheer yourself up is to try to cheer somebody else up.

When the kids are laughing in the audience, I tear up, I’m so happy I did a nice thing.

A quarrel is quickly settled when deserted by one party; there is no battle unless there be two.

A person once asked me, in a provocative manner, if I approved of homosexuality. I replied with another question: ‚Tell me: when God looks at a gay person, does he endorse the existence of this person with love, or reject and condemn this person?‘ We must always consider the person.

It is another’s fault if he be ungrateful, but it is mine if I do not give. To find one thankful man, I will oblige a great many that are not so.

As I got older, my pops tried to keep me involved with the culture by telling me the stories of the conflict between Ethiopia and Eritrea, how he came to America, and about our family back home, because all that side of my family – my aunties, grandparents – is in Africa.

Have you not noticed that love is silence? It may be while holding the hand of another, or looking lovingly at a child, or taking in the beauty of an evening. Love has no past or future, and so it is with this extraordinary state of silence.

Without friends no one would choose to live, though he had all other goods.

The most worth-while thing is to try to put happiness into the lives of others.

Go up close to your friend, but do not go over to him! We should also respect the enemy in our friend.

I was baptized by my father when I was 4 years old.

A little thought and a little kindness are often worth more than a great deal of money.

I have a personal ambition to live my life honestly and honor the true love that I’ve had and also the people I’ve had around me.

I have made a ceaseless effort not to ridicule, not to bewail, not to scorn human actions, but to understand them.

Friendship is always a sweet responsibility, never an opportunity.

My mother was a public school teacher in Virginia, and we didn’t have any money, we just survived on happiness, on being a happy family.

When I say I’m going to take care of a woman, I don’t just mean physically or sexually or romantically. I’m going to take care of her emotionally and spiritually. I’m going to take care of her in all ways. I take a lot of pride in that today.

My mom was a terrible parent of young children. And thank God – I thank God every time I think of it – I was sent to my paternal grandmother. Ah, but my mother was a great parent of a young adult.

My family, frankly, they weren’t folks who went to church every week. My mother was one of the most spiritual people I knew but she didn’t raise me in the church, so I came to my Christian faith later in life and it was because the precepts of Jesus Christ spoke to me in terms of the kind of life that I would want to lead.

I’m a people pleaser. I hold a lot of things in. I’m always making sure everybody is okay. I usually don’t rage; I usually don’t curse.

You can see neurosis from below – as a sickness – as most psychiatrists see it. Or you can understand it as a compassionate man might: respecting the neurosis as a fumbling and inefficient effort toward good ends.

We always deceive ourselves twice about the people we love – first to their advantage, then to their disadvantage.

Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love.

Acting is just a way of making a living, the family is life.

Love can consign us to hell or to paradise, but it always takes us somewhere.

It is always a strain when people are being killed. I don’t think anybody has held this job who hasn’t felt personally responsible for those being killed.

Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies.

Friends accept you the way you are.