Preaching is the expression of the moral sentiment in application to the duties of life.

Language is the dress of thought.

I can’t make a song for a particular person or demographic. If I love it, I’m gonna do it. I have to perform it for the rest of my life. A song is like a tattoo – you can never get away from it.

Evangelism is when the Gospel, which is good news, is preached or presented to all people.

So vast is art, so narrow human wit.

Lettin‘ the cat outta the bag is a whole lot easier ‚n puttin‘ it back in.

It’s a rather rude gesture, but at least it’s clear what you mean.

Music belongs to the people. To no one else. To no one else.

Perhaps when music has been shouting for so long, a quieter voice seems attractive.

If I have something to say, I want it to be meaningful.

Why did I write? Because I found life unsatisfactory.

I don’t know the law, the kind of law of quantity and quality, but I think the opportunity of people being able to express themselves and to have the means of production is a great thing. It’s also changing how we’re telling stories.

Once I’ve written something it does tend to run away from me. I don’t seem to have any part of it – it’s no longer my piece of writing.

I’ve been known to preach.

If it’s illegal to rock and roll, throw my ass in jail!

When I say ‚Crush your enemy‘, I don’t literally mean it.

If you have tears, prepare to shed them now.

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

Traveling around the world and preaching for over 70 years did not give much time for reflection.

My aim is to put down on paper what I see and what I feel in the best and simplest way.

Ten people who speak make more noise than ten thousand who are silent.

People have so much going on in their heads. I’m like, If you could write a song, you’d feel so much better!

My powers are ordinary. Only my application brings me success.

If we had more hell in the pulpit, we would have less hell in the pew.

I don’t see any boundaries between any of the art forms. I think they all inter-relate completely.

A letter does not blush.

You can’t always write a chord ugly enough to say what you want to say, so sometimes you have to rely on a giraffe filled with whipped cream.

Few people are capable of expressing with equanimity opinions which differ from the prejudices of their social environment. Most people are even incapable of forming such opinions.

Silence is safer than speech.

I cry very easily. It can be a movie, a phone conversation, a sunset – tears are words waiting to be written.

Fashion is an imposition, a reign on freedom.

‚No comment‘ is a splendid expression. I am using it again and again.

Let reverence for the laws be breathed by every American mother to the lisping babe that prattles on her lap – let it be taught in schools, in seminaries, and in colleges; let it be written in primers, spelling books, and in almanacs; let it be preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in legislative halls, and enforced in courts of justice.

The first condition of progress is the removal of censorship.

My father used to have an expression. He’d say, ‚Joey, a job is about a lot more than a paycheck. It’s about your dignity. It’s about respect. It’s about your place in your community.‘

There, in the chords and melodies, is everything I want to say. The words just jolly it along. It’s always been my way of expressing what, for me, is inexpressible by any other means.

And as a writer, one of the things that I’ve always been interested in doing is actually invading your comfort space. Because that’s what we’re supposed to do. Get under your skin, and make you react.

It is in this power of saying everything, and yet saying nothing too plainly, that the perfection of art consists.

My style influences my music and everything around me.

Words are cheap. The biggest thing you can say is ‚elephant‘.

The spirit of an age may be best expressed in the abstract ideal arts, for the spirit itself is abstract and ideal.

I feel, as a songwriter, it’s one of the hardest things to do – to sit down and say how you feel.

Writing, to me, is simply thinking through my fingers.

We are masters of the unsaid words, but slaves of those we let slip out.

I like the silent church before the service begins, better than any preaching.

Writing is like a ‚lust,‘ or like ‚scratching when you itch.‘ Writing comes as a result of a very strong impulse, and when it does come, I, for one, must get it out.

My role in society, or any artist’s or poet’s role, is to try and express what we all feel. Not to tell people how to feel. Not as a preacher, not as a leader, but as a reflection of us all.

When I speak at my local church, which I try to do 35 to 40 times a year, I try in every lesson to take the Old Testament text or New Testament text and apply them to what is happening to me or how that applies to the audience that I’m teaching in a modern, fast-changing, technological world. I use headlines, interfaith and that sort of thing.

No one means all he says, and yet very few say all they mean, for words are slippery and thought is viscous.

It’s funny because I’ve made a living off of words, but words get in the way of what you really want to say.

I’ve always appreciated a turn of phrase.

The writing is important, but the way you say the line and the pause you give it, the facial expression – all of that is very important.

I’m giving all that I have in this life. I’m opening up my notebook, and I’m saying everything in there out loud.

The typewriting machine, when played with expression, is no more annoying than the piano when played by a sister or near relation.

Songwriting is my way of channeling my feelings and my thoughts. Not just mine, but the things I see, the people I care about. My head would explode if I didn’t get some of that stuff out.

If I wish to compose or write or pray or preach well, I must be angry. Then all the blood in my veins is stirred, and my understanding is sharpened.

There’s an ecstatic side to writing. It’s like jazz. It just has a life.

Nothing is capable of being well set to music that is not nonsense.

I believe that some of us who were kept by God a long while before we found Him love Him better perhaps than we should have done if we had received Him directly, and we can preach better to others – we can speak more of His loving-kindness and tender mercy.

I design things to help people to hopefully express their personality.

I get a more passionate delivery when I just go in the booth and let the music talk.