Who is rich? He that is content. Who is that? Nobody.

We are much beholden to Machiavel and others, that write what men do, and not what they ought to do.

The reason why I wear gold – I wear gold for three reasons. One, when Jesus was born, three wise men came from the east: one brought frankincense, one brought myrrh, the other one brought gold. The second reason I wear gold is I can afford it. The third reason I wear it, it’s symbolic of my African heritage.

Sorry, I’m still a dialectical materialist.

As a vulnerability researcher, the greatest barrier I see is our low tolerance for vulnerability. We’re almost afraid to be happy. We feel like it’s inviting disaster.

I have wondered about time all my life.

The difficulty is to try and teach the multitude that something can be true and untrue at the same time.

Religion is more than life. Remember that his own religion is the truest to every man even if it stands low in the scales of philosophical comparison.

If I err in belief that the souls of men are immortal, I gladly err, nor do I wish this error which gives me pleasure to be wrested from me while I live.

Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blindfolded fear.

We must accept what science tells us, that man was born from the earth. But, more logical than the scientists who lecture us, we must carry this lesson to its conclusion: that is to say, accept that man was born entirely from the world – not only his flesh and bones but his incredible power of thought.

Wondrous is the strength of cheerfulness, and its power of endurance – the cheerful man will do more in the same time, will do it; better, will preserve it longer, than the sad or sullen.

I had to get rich so I could sing like I was poor again.

Pricey oil makes clear that wealth really is energy in various forms.

Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.

I think that success is having fun.

Real joy seems to me almost as unlike security or prosperity as it is unlike agony.

It is the privilege of the gods to want nothing, and of godlike men to want little.

Of course, I do everything for money.

A man is in general better pleased when he has a good dinner upon his table, than when his wife talks Greek.

Happiness depends upon ourselves.

In a way, the whole tangible universe itself is a vast residue, a skeleton of countless lives that have germinated in it and have left it, leaving behind them only a trifling, infinitesimal part of their riches.

I do not believe in a fate that falls on men however they act; but I do believe in a fate that falls on them unless they act.

Religion is not a department of life; it is something that enters into the whole of it.

Upon the subjects of which I have treated, I have spoken as I have thought. I may be wrong in regard to any or all of them; but, holding it a sound maxim that it is better only sometimes to be right than at all times to be wrong, so soon as I discover my opinions to be erroneous, I shall be ready to renounce them.

And we should consider every day lost on which we have not danced at least once. And we should call every truth false which was not accompanied by at least one laugh.

Truth is a good dog; but always beware of barking too close to the heels of an error, lest you get your brains kicked out.

The struggle itself towards the heights is enough to fill a man’s heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.

I am no longer sure of anything. If I satiate my desires, I sin but I deliver myself from them; if I refuse to satisfy them, they infect the whole soul.

The noblest pleasure is the joy of understanding.

Where knowledge ends, religion begins.

He who is unable to live in society, or who has no need because he is sufficient for himself, must be either a beast or a god.

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

I was not the son of a worker or lacking in material or social resources for a relatively comfortable existence; I could say I miraculously escaped wealth.

Man needs, for his happiness, not only the enjoyment of this or that, but hope and enterprise and change.

A man who is eating or lying with his wife or preparing to go to sleep in humility, thankfulness and temperance, is, by Christian standards, in an infinitely higher state than one who is listening to Bach or reading Plato in a state of pride.

Even when we have physical hardships, we can be very happy.

That country is the richest which nourishes the greatest number of noble and happy human beings.

Poor and content is rich, and rich enough.

To free a person from error is to give, and not to take away.

May you live your life as if the maxim of your actions were to become universal law.

If all our happiness is bound up entirely in our personal circumstances it is difficult not to demand of life more than it has to give.

Just as a candle cannot burn without fire, men cannot live without a spiritual life.

If you think only of evil, then you become pessimistic and hopeless like Freud. But if you think there is no evil, then you’re just one more deluded Pollyanna.

Man – a being in search of meaning.

Well, the future for me is already a thing of the past.

The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts: therefore, guard accordingly, and take care that you entertain no notions unsuitable to virtue and reasonable nature.

What difference is there between us, save a restless dream that follows my soul but fears to come near you?

For me, the opposite of scarcity is not abundance. It’s enough. I’m enough. My kids are enough.

We shall see but a little way if we require to understand what we see.

I love making people laugh. And I love laughing.

Agriculture not only gives riches to a nation, but the only riches she can call her own.

If thou wilt make a man happy, add not unto his riches but take away from his desires.

Without frugality none can be rich, and with it very few would be poor.

The key to immortality is first living a life worth remembering.

Man is not a machine that can be remodelled for quite other purposes as occasion demands, in the hope that it will go on functioning as regularly as before but in a quite different way. He carries his whole history with him; in his very structure is written the history of mankind.

Here we are, trapped in the amber of the moment. There is no why.

Science is not everything, but science is very beautiful.

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

The brain is wider than the sky.

Reason has always existed, but not always in a reasonable form.