Silence is the most perfect expression of scorn.

I had a great time being a salesman because of the pitches that I gave when I was selling shoes. However, I don’t think I’m as well versed in shoes as I am in comedy. Being a salesman was all about being a people person, and I enjoy being around people. I also love talking to people – which is why I think I did so well.

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

Money doesn’t talk, it swears.

I’m grateful for the opportunities God gave me to minister to people in high places; people in power have spiritual and personal needs like everyone else, and often they have no one to talk to.

You always have to remember that if you say something negative, it’s going to come back to haunt you.

Time was when they that feared the Lord spake often to one another; I am afraid that now they more often speak one against another.

The beauty of me being on stage is I have a voice.

If you wish to know the mind of a man, listen to his words.

Language is a weapon of politicians, but language is a weapon in much of human affairs.

Why should poetry have to make sense?

I did my utmost to ensure that everyone below me in the chain of command felt comfortable approaching me with concerns, ideas, thoughts, and even disagreements.

A remark generally hurts in proportion to its truth.

Worldly faces never look so worldly as at a funeral. They have the same effect of grating incongruity as the sound of a coarse voice breaking the solemn silence of night.

I meant what I said and I said what I meant.

I had to resign myself, many years ago, that I’m not too articulate when it comes to explaining how I feel about things. But my music does it for me, it really does.

My mother always taught us that if people don’t agree with you, the important thing is to listen to them. But if you’ve listened to them carefully and you still think that you’re right, then you must have the courage of your convictions.

I very much believe the Internet is indeed all it is cracked up to be.

The reason why men do not obey us, is because they see the mud at the bottom of our eye.

You have to listen very carefully and tell the truth if you are going to get a paranoid person to open up to you.

A bore is a person who opens his mouth and puts his feats in it.

Before I lost my voice, it was slurred, so only those close to me could understand, but with the computer voice, I found I could give popular lectures. I enjoy communicating science. It is important that the public understands basic science, if they are not to leave vital decisions to others.

Here in the West, people often don’t like listening to their leaders, even if they are right.

I prefer tongue-tied knowledge to ignorant loquacity.

There are really two core principles at play here. There’s giving people a voice so that people can express their opinions. Then, there’s keeping the community safe, which I think is really important. We’re not gonna let people plan violence or attack each other or do bad things.

People who have given us their complete confidence believe that they have a right to ours. The inference is false, a gift confers no rights.

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.

Silence is a source of great strength.

People use irony as a defense mechanism.

There can be no doubt that the average man blames much more than he praises. His instinct is to blame. If he is satisfied he says nothing; if he is not, he most illogically kicks up a row.

The capability of negotiating… is something that means you not only have to understand fully what you believe and what your national interests are but in order to be a really good negotiator, you have to try to figure out what the other person on the other side of the table has in mind.

Being flooded with information doesn’t mean we have the right information or that we’re in touch with the right people.

I very rarely think in words at all. A thought comes, and I may try to express it in words afterwards.

The greatest service that can be offered to children who show personality traits or inclinations that might not be understood by the adults around them is to allow them to express their own unique humanity.

The drawing teacher has this problem of communicating how to draw by osmosis and not by instruction, while the physics teacher has the problem of always teaching techniques, rather than the spirit, of how to go about solving physical problems.

What makes you a SEAL, what makes you a SEAL is being a good tactician on the battle field, understanding how to shoot, move, and communicate, knowing small unit maneuver warfare. That’s what makes a good SEAL, and so that is the course of instruction that I taught, was getting SEAL platoons ready for deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan.

I don’t understand why or how we can bully each other.

Animation can explain whatever the mind of man can conceive. This facility makes it the most versatile and explicit means of communication yet devised for quick mass appreciation.

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

Silence is the mother of truth.

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

My wife and I tried two or three times in the last 40 years to have breakfast together, but it was so disagreeable we had to stop.

I have all the emotions that everyone has; it just appears that I don’t.

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

I think it’s fair to say that personal computers have become the most empowering tool we’ve ever created. They’re tools of communication, they’re tools of creativity, and they can be shaped by their user.

Words are more powerful than some noises. Noises won’t last long. Lyrics are so important, and people don’t realise that.

I don’t like talking to celebrities.

The second time around, I’ll understand that, as a husband, my wife doesn’t care about my opinions. I just need to tell her the things that will continue to help me stack the brownie points.

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. So for me, it’s a great thing to be able to scream and say whatever I want.

I’ve been a lot more into Facebook and Twitter and Instagram, which was a bit complicated for me to understand the language of each social media, because they all talk in different ways. It’s a nice way for me to tell people I appreciate them, which I forget to do sometimes.

I used to stutter really badly. Everybody thinks it’s funny. And it’s not funny. It’s not.

Those who don’t know how to weep with their whole heart, don’t know how to laugh either.

There was one incident at a movie theater where my girl got mad at these guys who were talking behind us. I never looked back there, but she was like, ‚Will you all just shut up!‘ And I just got up and moved three rows in front. She was like, ‚What are you doing?!‘ I was like, ‚You better get up here! I don’t play the fighting games.‘

We don’t get to know people when they come to us; we must go to them to find out what they are like.

In the grip of a neurological disorder, I am fast losing control of words even as my relationship with the world has been reduced to them.

Meditation is to be aware of every thought and of every feeling, never to say it is right or wrong, but just to watch it and move with it. In that watching, you begin to understand the whole movement of thought and feeling. And out of this awareness comes silence.

Those who write clearly have readers, those who write obscurely have commentators.

I’m the most recognized and loved man that ever lived cuz there weren’t no satellites when Jesus and Moses were around, so people far away in the villages didn’t know about them.

Don’t be too harsh to these poems until they’re typed. I always think typescript lends some sort of certainty: at least, if the things are bad then, they appear to be bad with conviction.

Our most tragic error may have been our inability to establish a rapport and a confidence with the press and television with the communication media. I don’t think the press has understood me.

The difficulty with this conversation is that it’s very different from most of the ones I’ve had of late. Which, as I explained, have mostly been with trees.