The good opinion of mankind, like the lever of Archimedes, with the given fulcrum, moves the world.

I don’t see myself as a philosopher. That’s awfully boring.

Maybe this world is another planet’s hell.

I’m not a big believer in trying to jam stuff down somebody’s throat: ‚You’re going to do it my way.‘ I’d rather show by example and live my life and have people say, ‚You know what, I want to live like Joel has. He’s got peace and joy, and he seems content.‘

And, after all, what is a lie? ‚Tis but the truth in a masquerade.

Death is not the worst that can happen to men.

Change alone is eternal, perpetual, immortal.

It is easy to dismiss the world as ‚irrelevant,‘ or consumed by ‚paranoid anti-Americanism,‘ but perhaps not wise.

Truth lives, in fact, for the most part on a credit system. Our thoughts and beliefs pass, so long as nothing challenges them, just as bank-notes pass so long as nobody refuses them.

It was a favorite expression of Theophrastus that time was the most valuable thing that a man could spend.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison.

I just don’t like mutual funds. I think they’re a rip-off.

Blessed is the man who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed was the ninth beatitude.

Say not, ‚I have found the truth,‘ but rather, ‚I have found a truth.‘

Character may almost be called the most effective means of persuasion.

The universe may have a purpose, but nothing we know suggests that, if so, this purpose has any similarity to ours.

My mother, I suppose, is still a main figure in my life because her life was so sad and unfair, and she so brave, but also because she was determined to make me into the Sunday-school-recitation little girl I was, from the age of seven or so, fighting not to be.

The doorstep to the temple of wisdom is a knowledge of our own ignorance.

Keep me away from the wisdom which does not cry, the philosophy which does not laugh and the greatness which does not bow before children.

It is the superfluous things for which men sweat, – superfluous things that wear our togas theadbare, that force us to grow old in camp, that dash us upon foreign shores.

When I was 8 years old, it mattered what my favorite singer said and wore and expressed opinions about.

No obligation to do the impossible is binding.

It is beyond a doubt that all our knowledge begins with experience.

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

Never in any case say I have lost such a thing, but I have returned it. Is your child dead? It is a return. Is your wife dead? It is a return. Are you deprived of your estate? Is not this also a return?

It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere.

You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you mad.

As soon as questions of will or decision or reason or choice of action arise, human science is at a loss.

The only objects of practical reason are therefore those of good and evil. For by the former is meant an object necessarily desired according to a principle of reason; by the latter one necessarily shunned, also according to a principle of reason.

Life every man holds dear; but the dear man holds honor far more precious dear than life.

The progress of India is the destiny of one-sixth of humanity. And it will also mean a world more confident of its prosperity and more secure about its future.

Where there is reverence there is fear, but there is not reverence everywhere that there is fear, because fear presumably has a wider extension than reverence.

Madonna, I think, is the greatest visual musical artist that we’ve ever had. If you look at her photo log, the photographers that she was able to work with throughout her career framed her in the proper way. It was the proper context. It was that visual that made sure that everything was gonna cut through in a certain way.

As far as we can discern, the sole purpose of human existence is to kindle a light in the darkness of mere being.

When you look into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you.

If we go on your iPhone and go to the dictionary and look up ‚humble,‘ 80 per cent of the definition is negative. It’s a controlling word. It’s a way to control the masses and to control the sheep.

Everything in excess is opposed to nature.

How can one take delight in the world unless one flees to it for refuge?

It may be that our role on this planet is not to worship God – but to create him.

Power over a man’s subsistence is power over his will.

It is better to suffer wrong than to do it, and happier to be sometimes cheated than not to trust.

‚Love Story‘ is actually about a guy that I almost dated. But when I introduced him to my family and my friends, they all said they didn’t like him. All of them!

It has been said that man is a rational animal. All my life I have been searching for evidence which could support this.

Yesterday we obeyed kings and bent our necks before emperors. But today we kneel only to truth, follow only beauty, and obey only love.

To the dumb question, ‚Why me?‘ the cosmos barely bothers to return the reply, ‚Why not?‘

The future is something which everyone reaches at the rate of 60 minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is.

The end is the beginning of all things, Suppressed and hidden, Awaiting to be released through the rhythm Of pain and pleasure.

The nose of a mob is its imagination. By this, at any time, it can be quietly led.

Do not do unto others as you expect they should do unto you. Their tastes may not be the same.

Those whom the gods love grow young.

Men seldom, or rather never for a length of time and deliberately, rebel against anything that does not deserve rebelling against.

Chaos often breeds life, when order breeds habit.

The world is like a grand staircase, some are going up and some are going down.

We have the power to make this the best generation of mankind in the history of the world or to make it the last.

At the center of non-violence stands the principle of love.

The end of life is to be like God, and the soul following God will be like Him.

‚Tis better to bear the ills we have than fly to others that we know not of.

Good men by nature, wish to know. I know that many will call this useless work… men who desire nothing but material riches and are absolutely devoid of that of wisdom, which is the food and only true riches of the mind.

Non-violence is not a garment to be put on and off at will. Its seat is in the heart, and it must be an inseparable part of our being.

It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.

Society exists only as a mental concept; in the real world there are only individuals.