What if everything is an illusion and nothing exists? In that case, I definitely overpaid for my carpet.

When I left Dortmund, I said it’s not important what people think when you come in but what they think when you leave.

It’s a good thing I was born a girl, otherwise I’d be a drag queen.

When you read, I’m sure you don’t realize that your eyes are going backwards and forwards and to this place and that place. Mine don’t do that.

The world is so unpredictable. Things happen suddenly, unexpectedly. We want to feel we are in control of our own existence. In some ways we are, in some ways we’re not. We are ruled by the forces of chance and coincidence.

There is only one step from the sublime to the ridiculous.

Between us and heaven or hell there is only life, which is the frailest thing in the world.

It is by no means an irrational fancy that, in a future existence, we shall look upon what we think our present existence, as a dream.

Only two things are necessary to keep one’s wife happy. One is to let her think she is having her own way, and the other is to let her have it.

Bachelors know more about women than married men; if they didn’t they’d be married too.

There’s no way to remove the observer – us – from our perceptions of the world.

Behind every great man is a woman rolling her eyes.

Our existence is beyond our explanation, whether we believe in God or we have religion or we’re atheist. Our existence is beyond our understanding. No one has an answer.

If it’s true that our species is alone in the universe, then I’d have to say the universe aimed rather low and settled for very little.

I’m not confused. I’m just well mixed.

A particularly beautiful woman is a source of terror. As a rule, a beautiful woman is a terrible disappointment.

Praise undeserved, is satire in disguise.

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

Certain defects are necessary for the existence of individuality.

This is the truth: as from a fire aflame thousands of sparks come forth, even so from the Creator an infinity of beings have life and to him return again.

There is but an inch of difference between a cushioned chamber and a padded cell.

The intelligent man finds almost everything ridiculous, the sensible man hardly anything.

I would warn you that I do not attribute to nature either beauty or deformity, order or confusion. Only in relation to our imagination can things be called beautiful or ugly, well-ordered or confused.

Marriage is a wonderful institution, but who would want to live in an institution?

The funny thing is people won’t let me pay for things. I’ll be in a restaurant and the manager will say, ‚Oh no, it’s on the house.‘

I want to know why the universe exists, why there is something greater than nothing.

It’s sometimes comical to hear the younger generation ask their peers to repeat themselves.

Many a man’s reputation would not know his character if they met on the street.

My age is very insignificant to me. I don’t think about it, but the world does. The world likes young people in general.

Everybody looks like clones and the only people you notice are my age. I don’t notice anybody unless they look great, and every now and again they do, and they are usually 70.

It all depends on how we look at things, and not how they are in themselves.

A diplomat is a man who always remembers a woman’s birthday but never remembers her age.

What I have never been afraid of is to be a little silly, and you can engage people that way. My view is, first you get them to laugh, then you get them to listen.

I know I’m more on television, and I’m more recognisable than maybe even the players because they run and train, but I just stand there, and my face does all these funny things that everyone can see all the time.

Part of the reason for the ugliness of adults, in a child’s eyes, is that the child is usually looking upwards, and few faces are at their best when seen from below.

Let us beware of saying that death is the opposite of life. The living being is only a species of the dead, and a very rare species.

That is why, no matter how desperate the predicament is, I am always very much in earnest about clutching my cane, straightening my derby hat and fixing my tie, even though I have just landed on my head.

We do not see people as they are, but as they appear to us. And these appearances are usually misleading.

No object is so beautiful that, under certain conditions, it will not look ugly.

I’m looking for backing for an unauthorized auto-biography that I am writing. Hopefully, this will sell in such huge numbers that I will be able to sue myself for an extraordinary amount of money and finance the film version in which I will play everybody.

I think being funny is not anyone’s first choice.

I’ve just had eighteen straight whiskies. I think that’s the record.

Exposure from a young age to the realities of the world is a super-big thing.

I met Woz when I was 13, at a friend’s garage. He was about 18. He was, like, the first person I met who knew more electronics than I did at that point. We became good friends, because we shared an interest in computers and we had a sense of humor. We pulled all kinds of pranks together.

I am odd-looking. I sometimes think I look like a funny Muppet.

Who is richer? The man who is seen, but cannot see? Or the man who is not being seen, but can see?

Some people feel affronted when something they thought to be true doesn’t happen. If that’s the case, then your sense of risk is much higher, and that leads to risk aversion. You need to be able to be comfortable in uncertainty.

Whatever deceives men seems to produce a magical enchantment.

Noise proves nothing. Often a hen who has merely laid an egg cackles as if she laid an asteroid.

Things are more like they are now than they ever were before.

I have no problem yelling at anybody’s kid – free of charge!

I am thankful for laughter, except when milk comes out of my nose.

Whether if soul did not exist time would exist or not, is a question that may fairly be asked; for if there cannot be someone to count there cannot be anything that can be counted, so that evidently there cannot be number; for number is either what has been, or what can be, counted.

To me, comedy is just twisting reality. It’s commenting or observing or twisting life.

If you’re serious, you really understand that it’s important that you laugh as much as possible and admit that you’re the funniest person you ever met. You have to laugh. Admit that you’re funny. Otherwise, you die in solemnity.

An enemy generally says and believes what he wishes.

Lies are sufficient to breed opinion, and opinion brings on substance.

Age is whatever you think it is. You are as old as you think you are.

When I was a kid, I never did funny things to get attention. I was never a funny person. I was never, like, ‚Oh, wow. I could say this some day on stage.‘

For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.

A true artist is expected to be all that is noble-minded, and this is not altogether a mistake; on the other hand, however, in what a mean way are critics allowed to pounce upon us.