It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.

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

The best security for civilization is the dwelling, and upon properly appointed and becoming dwellings depends, more than anything else, the improvement of mankind.

Society has always to demand a little more from human beings than it will get in practice.

Even paranoids have real enemies.

In December, I agreed to extend the tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans because it was the only way I could prevent a tax hike on middle-class Americans. But we cannot afford $1 trillion worth of tax cuts for every millionaire and billionaire in our society. We can’t afford it. And I refuse to renew them again.

You might be tough, but you can only be so tough for so long, you know what I mean? The brain can only take so much damage. The body can only take so much damage.

Mystical references to society and its programs to help may warm the hearts of the gullible but what it really means is putting more power in the hands of bureaucrats.

It is clearly better that property should be private, but the use of it common; and the special business of the legislator is to create in men this benevolent disposition.

I’ve had two cancer bouts in my years on the Court, and the first one, Justice O’Connor told me, ‚Now, you do the chemotherapy on Friday because you’ll get over it during the weekend and you can be back in court on Monday.‘

People have different emotional levels. Especially when you’re young.

Humanity I love you because when you’re hard up you pawn your intelligence to buy a drink.

Since I have come to America, I am often asked whether my next novel will be set in America. I don’t think it will. I think I will be living in America for some time to come, but while living in America, I would like to write about Japanese society from the outside.

Americans are rising to the tasks of history, and they expect the same of us.

In order to acquire a growing and lasting respect in society, it is a good thing, if you possess great talent, to give, early in your youth, a very hard kick to the right shin of the society that you love. After that, be a snob.

The first duty of a state is to see that every child born therein shall be well housed, clothed, fed and educated till it attains years of discretion.

Happiness is within the reach of everyone, rich or poor. Yet comparatively few people are happy. I believe the reason for this is that the majority don’t recognize happiness even when it is within their grasp.

Anxiety does not empty tomorrow of its sorrows, but only empties today of its strength.

The world is all the richer for having a devil in it, so long as we keep our foot upon his neck.

Wherever there is a settled society, religion is necessary; the laws cover manifest crimes, and religion covers secret crimes.

If I relaxed, if I took my foot off the gas, I would probably die.

I sometimes wish I were suffering in a good cause, or risking my life for the good of others, instead of just being a gravely endangered patient.

The love of the family, the love of one person can heal. It heals the scars left by a larger society. A massive, powerful society.

Hearing voices no one else can hear isn’t a good sign, even in the wizarding world.

When your physical energy and mind combines, it’s great.

Kids who have an understanding of how and why their feelings are what they are are much more likely to talk to us about what’s happening, and they have better skills to work it out.

To enjoy good health, to bring true happiness to one’s family, to bring peace to all, one must first discipline and control one’s own mind. If a man can control his mind he can find the way to Enlightenment, and all wisdom and virtue will naturally come to him.

I have this really high priority on happiness and finding something to be happy about.

In much of society, research means to investigate something you do not know or understand.

In the literal sense, there has been no relevant evolution since the trek from Africa. But there has been substantial progress towards higher standards of rights, justice and freedom – along with all too many illustrations of how remote is the goal of a decent society.

Arguments are extremely vulgar, for everyone in good society holds exactly the same opinion.

I think the first duty of society is justice.

I like America, just as everybody else does. I love America, I gotta say that. But America will be judged.

A deep sense of love and belonging is an irreducible need of all people. We are biologically, cognitively, physically, and spiritually wired to love, to be loved, and to belong. When those needs are not met, we don’t function as we were meant to. We break. We fall apart. We numb. We ache. We hurt others. We get sick.

Chemotherapy isn’t good for you. So when you feel bad, as I am feeling now, you think, ‚Well that is a good thing because it’s supposed to be poison. If it’s making the tumor feel this queasy, then I’m OK with it.‘

The healthiest competition occurs when average people win by putting above average effort.

Health is the greatest possession. Contentment is the greatest treasure. Confidence is the greatest friend. Non-being is the greatest joy.

If in our daily life we can smile, if we can be peaceful and happy, not only we, but everyone will profit from it. This is the most basic kind of peace work.

I think beating myself up sometimes and knowing I am not happy when I do it makes me work harder to do a good job.

The society in ‚The Handmaid’s Tale‘ is a throwback to the early Puritans whom I studied extensively at Harvard under Perry Miller, to whom the book is dedicated.

Keeping an active mind has been vital to my survival, as has been maintaining a sense of humor.

Isn’t it funny how babies laugh a lot? I read a toddler, a young child laughs 300 times a day. The average adult laughs, like, four times a day. God put it in them. He put the laugh in us, but I think sometimes we let life get us down, you know, have bad breaks, and we lose our breaks.

Exercise is labor without weariness.

A merry heart doeth good like medicine.

We should feel sorrow, but not sink under its oppression.

The important question is not, what will yield to man a few scattered pleasures, but what will render his life happy on the whole amount.

I believe that the greatest gift you can give your family and the world is a healthy you.

I drive way too fast to worry about cholesterol.

Happiness: a good bank account, a good cook, and a good digestion.

Dread, which is closely related to fear, steals the ability to enjoy ordinary life and makes people anxious about the future. It keeps them from looking forward to the next day, the next month, or the next decade.

I admire people who destroy themselves.

If you’re too free, you’re like the way Hong Kong is now. It’s very chaotic.

He who is unable to live in society, or who has no need because he is sufficient for himself, must be either a beast or a god.

Why are women… so much more interesting to men than men are to women?

All partisan movements add to the fullness of our understanding of society as a whole. They never detract; or, in any case, one must not allow them to do so. Experience adds to experience.

One good thing about acting in film is that it’s good therapy.

In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place, oblige it to control itself.

A nation which has forgotten the quality of courage which in the past has been brought to public life is not as likely to insist upon or regard that quality in its chosen leaders today – and in fact we have forgotten.

It is a vain hope to make people happy by politics.

If you start to think of your physical and moral condition, you usually find that you are sick.

I think one of the great things about the United States has been our ability to maintain a distinction between our military and domestic law enforcement.