There are goods so opposed that we cannot seize both, but, by too much prudence, may pass between them at too great a distance to reach either.

My mom was on the United Way group that decides how to allocate the money and looks at all the different charities and makes the very hard decisions about where that pool of funds is going to go.

I’m not a marketing person. I don’t ask myself questions. I go by instinct.

The strongest principle of growth lies in the human choice.

My parents had us in church every Sunday, every Wednesday. It was more of a tradition at that point; I didn’t have a personal relationship with the Lord until I went to the altar call one Sunday, and the youth pastor told us to make a decision for ourselves.

Probable impossibilities are to be preferred to improbable possibilities.

The trouble with always trying to preserve the health of the body is that it is so difficult to do without destroying the health of the mind.

Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds.

Political courage is not political suicide.

Order without liberty and liberty without order are equally destructive.

Although prepared for martyrdom, I preferred that it be postponed.

When you get angry, your options narrow.

You only have to do a very few things right in your life so long as you don’t do too many things wrong.

A man can’t be too careful in the choice of his enemies.

In the late Fifties and early Sixties, opposition to state terror and aggression and torture and so on was zero. That was a horrible time: the massive Kennedy terror operation against Cuba, the first attacks on Vietnam in 1962, the imposition of national security states in South America.

The executive has no right, in any case, to decide the question, whether there is or is not cause for declaring war.

I never resist temptation, because I have found that things that are bad for me do not tempt me.

I bought a company in the mid-’90s called Dexter Shoe and paid $400 million for it. And it went to zero. And I gave about $400 million worth of Berkshire stock, which is probably now worth $400 billion. But I’ve made lots of dumb decisions. That’s part of the game.

To me, consensus seems to be the process of abandoning all beliefs, principles, values and policies. So it is something in which no one believes and to which no one objects.

I never do anything that I don’t want to do.

You can’t have a value structure without a hierarchy. They’re the same thing because a value structure means one thing takes precedence over another.

The safest course is to do nothing against one’s conscience. With this secret, we can enjoy life and have no fear from death.

When you are young you tend to do so many things that are not needed. When you get experience, you know what exactly what works for you and you tend to do things that you want.

Beautiful sentences pop into my head. Beautiful sentences that aren’t always absolutely accurate. Then, I have to choose between the beautiful sentence and being absolutely accurate. It can be a difficult choice.

Beware the hobby that eats.

Strength and compassion are not mutually exclusive.

I thought ‚Heller‘ was a very bad decision.

It is far more difficult to be simple than to be complicated; far more difficult to sacrifice skill and easy execution in the proper place, than to expand both indiscriminately.

Faced with what is right, to leave it undone shows a lack of courage.

No one can give you better advice than yourself.

I think women want to take care of themselves, and I think having a voice in how that is done is very important.

We misjudge risk if we feel we have some control over it, even if it’s an illusory sense of control.

The men who have succeeded are men who have chosen one line and stuck to it.

One must verify or expel his doubts, and convert them into the certainty of Yes or NO.

I always wanted to do things right and represent myself as somebody that took the art serious and someone that took the business serious also, so I had time to weigh the options and figure it out and do my best to create the situation that was ideal.

The advantage of the emotions is that they lead us astray.

Physical strength can never permanently withstand the impact of spiritual force.

If you only do things where you know the answer in advance, your company goes away.

No one person controls Microsoft. The board and the shareholders decide whether they want to have me as CEO.

Indecision may or may not be my problem.

The superfluous, a very necessary thing.

It is a fine game to play – the game of politics – and it is well worth waiting for a good hand before really plunging.

The meaning of peace is the absence of opposition to socialism.

Compromise used to mean that half a loaf was better than no bread. Among modern statesmen it really seems to mean that half a loaf; is better than a whole loaf.

There are risks and costs to action. But they are far less than the long range risks of comfortable inaction.

Everything in excess is opposed to nature.

The wise use of your freedom to make your own decisions is crucial to your spiritual growth, now and for eternity.

Martyrs, my friend, have to choose between being forgotten, mocked or used. As for being understood – never.

If the critics are right that I’ve made all my decisions based on polls, then I must not be very good at reading them.

He who does not mind his belly, will hardly mind anything else.

If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it.

Liberty must be limited in order to be possessed.

The shortest answer is doing the thing.

The world is in a constant conspiracy against the brave. It’s the age-old struggle: the roar of the crowd on the one side, and the voice of your conscience on the other.

On the whole, human beings want to be good, but not too good, and not quite all the time.

The torment of precautions often exceeds the dangers to be avoided. It is sometimes better to abandon one’s self to destiny.

You know, I live a monastic lifestyle. No, I do. I do live in extremes, basically. I go back and forth. Once every six months, I’ll have a day where I eat more chocolate than has ever been consumed by a human being.

One aspect of appellate judging is we have to give reasons for all of our decisions. And when you sit down and try to write it out, sometimes you find that your first judgment wasn’t the right one.

Ridiculous yachts and private planes and big limousines won’t make people enjoy life more, and it sends out terrible messages to the people who work for them. It would be so much better if that money was spent in Africa – and it’s about getting a balance.

At the end of the day, when it comes time to make that decision, as president, all you have to guide you are your values, and your vision, and the life experiences that make you who you are.

Forethought we may have, undoubtedly, but not foresight.