My philosophy is, it’s always very rewarding when you can make an audience laugh. I don’t mind making fun of myself. I like self-deprecating comedy. But I’d like you to laugh with me occasionally, too.

Since God created the world, He also created reality.

What makes all doctrines plain and clear? About two hundred pounds a year. And that which was proved true before, prove false again? Two hundred more.

If it is surely the means to the highest end we know, can any work be humble or disgusting? Will it not rather be elevating as a ladder, the means by which we are translated?

And thou wilt give thyself relief, if thou doest every act of thy life as if it were the last.

Nothing shows a man’s character more than what he laughs at.

Necessity is not an established fact, but an interpretation.

I can see, and that is why I can be happy, in what you call the dark, but which to me is golden. I can see a God-made world, not a manmade world.

The funny thing is people won’t let me pay for things. I’ll be in a restaurant and the manager will say, ‚Oh no, it’s on the house.‘

My absolute favourite piece of information is the fact that young sloths are so inept that they frequently grab their own arms and legs instead of tree limbs, and fall out of trees.

For centuries, theologians have been explaining the unknowable in terms of the-not-worth-knowing.

The ultimate value of life depends upon awareness and the power of contemplation rather than upon mere survival.

If co-operation is a duty, I hold that non-co-operation also under certain conditions is equally a duty.

The universe is change; our life is what our thoughts make it.

Nothing is divine but what is agreeable to reason.

If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts, but if he will content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties.

I have learned that only two things are necessary to keep one’s wife happy. First, let her think she’s having her own way. And second, let her have it.

Humor is reason gone mad.

Writers are a little below clowns and a little above trained seals.

He who despairs of the human condition is a coward, but he who has hope for it is a fool.

I get that racism exists, but it’s not a catalyst for my content. I don’t need to talk about race to have material. My style of comedy is more self-deprecating. I think that makes me more relatable. When you deal with ‚topics‘ – race, white versus black – you’re not separating from the pack. You’re doing what everybody else is doing.

To me, the extraordinary aspect of martial arts lies in its simplicity. The easy way is also the right way, and martial arts is nothing at all special; the closer to the true way of martial arts, the less wastage of expression there is.

To depend upon a profession is a less odious form of slavery than to depend upon a father.

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

The difference between Socrates and Jesus? The great conscious and the immeasurably great unconscious.

Is life worth living? It all depends on the liver.

She laughs at everything you say. Why? Because she has fine teeth.

Believe it or not, I make myself laugh. Sometimes when I have thoughts or say some things that are funny, it just makes me laugh, and I don’t mind laughing at it before you guys do.

You know those things that you throw the twigs into and it spits them out? That’s what I do. The branches are like life, and I throw them into my head and some of it comes out as humor.

Existence precedes and rules essence.

I believe in believing. My coach John Kavanagh is a big atheist, and he is always trying to persuade people to his way of thinking, and I think, ‚What a waste of energy.‘ If people want to believe in this god or that god, that’s fine by me; believe away. But I think we can be our own gods. I believe in myself.

Silence is as deep as eternity, speech a shallow as time.

Ice-cream is exquisite – what a pity it isn’t illegal.

One of the things you’re doing when you make art, apart from entertaining yourself and other people, is trying to see what ways of working feel good, what feels right.

Life consists in what a man is thinking of all day.

Culture of the mind must be subservient to the heart.

I don’t believe in the after life, although I am bringing a change of underwear.

You may be able to read Bernard Shaw’s plays, you may be able to quote Shakespeare or Voltaire or some new philosopher; but if you in yourself are not intelligent, if you are not creative, what is the point of this education?

If you tell me there’s something I can’t do, I’ll want to do it even more. Especially when it comes to entertaining.

The desire to annoy no one, to harm no one, can equally well be the sign of a just as of an anxious disposition.

Why can’t I just eat my waffle?

The unnatural, that too is natural.

The poets have been mysteriously silent on the subject of cheese.

People don’t want drama 365 days a year. I’m a sense of relief; it’s my job to take your mind off what’s bad for that brief second you’re in the room with me, regardless of shape, race, colour or anything. It brings people together, and it makes me feel good about what I’m doing.

What’s with you men? Would hair stop growing on your chest if you asked directions somewhere?

Only when you drink from the river of silence shall you indeed sing. And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb. And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance.

A difference of taste in jokes is a great strain on the affections.

Reason is the enemy of faith.

I can remember earning £5,000 a game playing for Hibs at the end of the Seventies. They let me commute from London, train on the Friday and play on Saturday. That lasted until my friends at the Inland Revenue decided to take two-thirds. That wasn’t very entertaining for me.

Nothing can come of nothing.

What I like about the jokes, to me it’s a lot of logic, no matter how crazy they are. It has to make absolute sense, or it won’t be funny.

The infliction of cruelty with a good conscience is a delight to moralists. That is why they invented Hell.

To act is to be committed, and to be committed is to be in danger.

Death to me means nothing as long as I can die fast.

Everything that happens once can never happen again. But everything that happens twice will surely happen a third time.

If I am not allowed to laugh in heaven, I don’t want to go there.

From there to here, and here to there, funny things are everywhere.

I have gained this from philosophy: that I do without being commanded what others do only from fear of the law.

There is more wisdom in your body than in your deepest philosophy.

I spent much of my childhood in northern Quebec, and often there was no radio, no television – there wasn’t a lot to entertain us. When it rained, I stayed inside reading, writing, drawing.

To me, if life boils down to one thing, it’s movement. To live is to keep moving.