My mother’s love has always been a sustaining force for our family, and one of my greatest joys is seeing her integrity, her compassion, her intelligence reflected in my daughters.

I have ‚Parents‘ magazine in my home.

My greatest blessing has been the birth of my son. My next greatest blessing has been my ability to turn people into children of mine.

We fear that this moment will end, that we won’t get what we need, that we will lose what we love, or that we will not be safe. Often, our biggest fear is the knowledge that one day our bodies will cease functioning. So even when we are surrounded by all the conditions for happiness, our joy is not complete.

My mom cleaned toilets for a long time, and she’d seen a lot of terrible things, but she was still the strength of our family. And there are women like that all across the country – all around the world – who show that type of fortitude.

My kids are the funniest two human beings there are.

I would love to continue in music, with writing… but I am not the kind of person who will hang around if I start to become irrelevant. If that happens, I will bow down gracefully, raise my kids, and have a garden. And I am going to let my hair go gray when I am older. I don’t need to be blonde when I’m 60!

In our home there was always prayer – aloud, proud and unapologetic.

I never promise anything. I don’t promise anything to my mum. I don’t promise anything to the supporters.

My mother said I must always be intolerant of ignorance but understanding of illiteracy. That some people, unable to go to school, were more educated and more intelligent than college professors.

If your mom cries a lot, you probably cry a lot. It’s what you learn.

The wise are instructed by reason, average minds by experience, the stupid by necessity and the brute by instinct.

I’ve been very lucky. I come from a very close family.

I listen to my mother, and that keeps me out of trouble. I’m a good son.

I have 22 grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and they keep me young.

When will our consciences grow so tender that we will act to prevent human misery rather than avenge it?

Christmas is joy, religious joy, an inner joy of light and peace.

Humor is mankind’s greatest blessing.

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

I’ve never had a divorce, but I’ve seen so many of my friends, my sister, my family go through that stuff, so I try to write for the people that can’t write about it. I take on their sorrow, so I’m able to kind of express it, or their joy.

If you have the chance to be exposed to a loving, understanding environment where the seed of compassion, loving kindness, can be watered every day, then you become a more loving person.

My father used to wear the same pants for like a week.

All men are children, and of one family. The same tale sends them all to bed, and wakes them in the morning.

I just really believe people have to get hungry. I think maybe what we need to do, instead of trying to stuff our beliefs down people’s throats, is just pray for them to really be hungry and to see their neediness.

I’m a meathead. I can’t help it, man. You’ve got smart people and you’ve got dumb people.

OK, I have a nickname. My family calls me ‚Trey‘ because I’m William the third. My dad has the same name, which is always confusing because my dad is well known, and I’m also known.

A man will speedily sit down and sympathize with a friend’s griefs, but if he sees him honored and esteemed, he is apt to regard him as a rival and does not so readily rejoice with him. This ought not to be; without effort, we ought to be happy in our brother’s happiness.

The impossible often has a kind of integrity which the merely improbable lacks.

One man cannot hold another man down in the ditch without remaining down in the ditch with him.

The sexiest people are thinkers. Nobody’s interested in somebody who’s just vain with a hole in their head, talking about the latest thing – there is no latest thing. It’s all rubbish.

Before I was born, my father told my mother, ‚If it’s a boy, he’s going to be a scientist.‘

My mom is American, so I was raised in her household in my formative years.

I grew up upper-class. Private school. My dad had a Jaguar. We’re African-American, and we work together as a family, so people assume we’re like the Jacksons. But I didn’t have parents using me to get out of a bad situation.

Men feel that cruelty to the poor is a kind of cruelty to animals. They never feel that it is an injustice to equals; nay it is treachery to comrades.

You know that your happiness and suffering depend on the happiness and suffering of others. That insight helps you not to do wrong things that will bring suffering to yourself and to other people.

Whoever is careless with the truth in small matters cannot be trusted with important matters.

Shall I not have intelligence with the earth? Am I not partly leaves and vegetable mould myself.

I am just happy to be part of the Nike family.

I don’t know who my grandfather was; I am much more concerned to know what his grandson will be.

Returning to your family and where you came from, and your history… this is what makes you strong. It’s not looking out that’s going to do that – it’s looking in.

If a man’s character is to be abused there’s nobody like a relative to do the business.

One of the most pervasive political visions of our time is the vision of liberals as compassionate and conservatives as less caring.

The fact is, I was never too bright in school. I ain’t ashamed of it, though. I mean, how much do school principals make a month?

There is something terribly morbid in the modern sympathy with pain. One should sympathise with the colour, the beauty, the joy of life. The less said about life’s sores the better.

No face which we can give to a matter will stead us so well at last as the truth. This alone wears well.

I’m happiest with my family around me.

I want to thank God, obviously for the health, for the talent He’s given me, for my family who supports me, for the things that basketball’s taught me on and off the court. For the people that I’ve been able to meet through the game of basketball.

My family has very strong women. My mother never laughed at my dream of Africa, even though everyone else did because we didn’t have any money, because Africa was the ‚dark continent‘, and because I was a girl.

Our inquiring friends and neighbors not of our faith can also catch the wave. We encourage them to keep all that is good and true in their lives. And we invite them to receive more, especially the glorious truth that through God’s eternal plan, families can be together forever.

All things considered, there’s nobody better for children than parents.

In my later years, I have looked in the mirror each day and found a happy person staring back. Occasionally I wonder why I can be so happy. The answer is that every day of my life I’ve worked only for myself and for the joy that comes from writing and creating. The image in my mirror is not optimistic, but the result of optimal behavior.

Love grows by giving. The love we give away is the only love we keep. The only way to retain love is to give it away.

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!

People are always coming up to me and saying, ‚I heard your dad’s speech, and it’s really great.‘ And they’ll mention some place I didn’t even know my dad was going to.

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

My real dream is to have a whole, like, buy a whole piece of land. Imagine, like, a long driveway. Like, a cul de sac-type street, with maybe, like, seven houses. Me be right here. Have my mom be able to be right here. My brother over here. My girl’s grandmother and family right here. Friends over there. That’s my real dream.

The just is close to the people’s heart, but the merciful is close to the heart of God.

I was brought up as an only child, and we were very close. But when I was 14, we got evicted. We came home to a padlock, and I looked up at my mom and she was crying, and there was nothing to do.

No lying knight or lying priest ever prospered in any age, but especially not in the dark ones. Men prospered then only in following an openly declared purpose, and preaching candidly beloved and trusted creeds.

A man is ethical only when life, as such, is sacred to him, that of plants and animals as that of his fellow men, and when he devotes himself helpfully to all life that is in need of help.

A man should never neglect his family for business.