Taste is the only morality. Tell me what you like and I’ll tell you what you are.

In law a man is guilty when he violates the rights of others. In ethics he is guilty if he only thinks of doing so.

I’m no natural beauty. If I’m gonna have any looks at all, I’m gonna have to create them.

Chastity does not mean abstention from sexual wrong; it means something flaming, like Joan of Arc.

I write for the same reason I breathe – because if I didn’t, I would die.

All my big mistakes are when I try to second-guess or please an audience. My work is always stronger when I get very selfish about it.

I think that I do feel that my nature is to express what this self, this particular self at this time, experiences in the world. And that is so organic – I use this metaphor a lot but I’ll use it again – it’s like a pine tree producing pine cones, or a blackberry bush producing blackberries – it’s just what happens with this being, now.

I’m guarded; I don’t talk much.

Some people are jerks, and some people aren’t.

I feel like the reason people feel like they know me is because I’m giving you myself in the music. There’s where the connection comes from; you can’t Twitter that.

Blessedness is not the reward of virtue but virtue itself.

Show me the man you honor, and I will know what kind of man you are.

I don’t have to see a murder in order to condemn murder.

If it is not right do not do it; if it is not true do not say it.

A man should be upright, not be kept upright.

Morality is of the highest importance – but for us, not for God.

I do not believe in the God of theology who rewards good and punishes evil.

If I’m inspired to make a certain kind of song, I’m going to make that kind of song, no matter if it’s what they know me as or think I am.

Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested.

Writing saved me from the sin and inconvenience of violence.

A lot of people have said I’d have probably done better in my career if I hadn’t looked so cheap and gaudy. But I dress to be comfortable for me, and you shouldn’t be blamed because you want to look pretty.

Ultimately, I’m not doing that much. I’m only doing what a human being who feels wants to do – in my way, without stepping out of my flow, while staying in my lane. Without, I guess, boring people.

There is in me an anarchy and frightful disorder. Creating makes me die a thousand deaths, because it means making order, and my entire being rebels against order. But without it I would die, scattered to the winds.

I write all of my own speeches.

As a musician and a songwriter, it is an act of the ego to believe that other people might be interested in your point of view. But it is usually an empathetic nature that gets you going in the first place.

An Englishman thinks he is moral when he is only uncomfortable.

Evil is whatever distracts.

An artist or a creative person of any kind goes about their work because it’s their path, it’s what excites them, it’s what aligns their soul with who they truly are, who they showed up to be.

The man who has won millions at the cost of his conscience is a failure.

I like to be myself, and I don’t pretend. For instance, I don’t dress up for occasions; I am what I am.

It’s kind of like a challenge to myself to be able to hear somebody else’s hook and kind of interpret the words. Because my own hooks, I already know what I mean when I write them.

There is nothing in which people more betray their character than in what they laugh at.

Well, I’ll put it this way: you can certainly say belief in God makes people behave worse. That can be proved beyond a doubt.

It’s not difficult for me to put my feelings into written form. I try to be concise and to go direct to the subject. This is what people like about my work, and what the critics hate.

Love of beauty is taste. The creation of beauty is art.

It’s not about charisma and personality, it’s about results and products and those very bedrock things that are why people at Apple and outside of Apple are getting more excited about the company and what Apple stands for and what its potential is to contribute to the industry.

I am who I am and I say what I think. I’m not putting a face on for the record.

I love tattoos. And mine symbolise who I really am. I have a Samurai on my left arm. At a subconscious level, I connect to this warrior and model myself on his discipline, skills and honour. There is also a tribal tattoo and a Chinese symbol of faith. I have seen a lot of people getting tattoos just because it’s a trend.

Virtue is not left to stand alone. He who practices it will have neighbors.

Forgiveness is not a feeling – it’s a decision we make because we want to do what’s right before God. It’s a quality decision that won’t be easy and it may take time to get through the process, depending on the severity of the offense.

I feel the emotion that life conjures up and the songs I write get me closer to my feelings and realising who I am. It’s a natural process.

One of the great questions of philosophy is, do we innately have morality, or do we get it from celestial dictation? A study of the Ten Commandments is a very good way of getting into and resolving that issue.

Act that your principle of action might safely be made a law for the whole world.

A system of morality which is based on relative emotional values is a mere illusion, a thoroughly vulgar conception which has nothing sound in it and nothing true.

You might say that Lyndon Johnson is a cross between a Baptist preacher and a cowboy.

I have always had a talent for irritating women since I was fourteen.

I’ve been lucky – all the ads I’ve got, I’ve got to be myself. I haven’t had to act too much or tried too hard to be someone I’m not. I think that’s why people sort of like them. Even the Fastrack ads I did with Genelia.

I’m happy being myself, which I’ve never been before. I always hid in other people, or tried to find myself through the characters, or live out their lives, but I didn’t have those things in mine.

If the machine of government is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law.

When I was making the early stuff, I never expected it to be so big. I was in my own kind of bubble. I never wanted to tour; I just wanted to create music and make a diary I could put out into the world. And sometimes, I became the characters.

I feel like in my music I can be a rebel. I can say things I wouldn’t say in real life.

I’m an absolutely normal guy.

I write from my soul. This is the reason that critics don’t hurt me, because it is me. If it was not me, if I was pretending to be someone else, then this could unbalance my world, but I know who I am.

I just wanted to be a songwriter. I did really not like the sound of my own voice.

That old law about ‚an eye for an eye‘ leaves everybody blind. The time is always right to do the right thing.

There’s something about being in front of a live audience that’s fun. It’s a really interesting, very electric, very alive, and intense experience, and you can’t get it anywhere else. And I’ve been doing it since I was 23, so it’s part of my being – it’s part of my fabric as a person.

Writers write to influence their readers, their preachers, their auditors, but always, at bottom, to be more themselves.

Although designers continue to dream of ‚transparency‘ – technologies that just do their job without making their presence felt – both creators and audiences actually like technologies with ‚personality.‘

He who would be no slave must consent to have no slave. Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves and, under a just God, cannot long retain it.

I want to look my best for God. So many people have the attitude that if you’re a Christian you’ve got to dress bad, wear an old color, not do anything to your hair, have nothing. It’s no wonder that Christianity is not very attractive. I mean, how many people do you know in a Western culture that’s going to go, ‚Yeah, give me some of that?‘

None of the records I make are ever a deliberate construction – they’re always an expression of who I am at the time and where I am in my life.