“I’ve read hundreds of cookbooks. Most of those cookbooks don’t even tell you how to get a steak ready, how to bake biscuits or an apple pie.”

I’ve read hundreds of cookbooks. For my money, they are the bird.

There’s something inside of me that makes me want to help people, especially people who are having difficulty of some kind.

No hours, nor amount of labor, nor amount of money would deter me from giving the best that there was in me.

Scientists are a bunch of romantics.

My life isn’t over and I’m not going to sit in a rocking chair and take money from the government.

I think a dream is just a suggestion to start something out, do something.

There’s no reason to be the richest man in the cemetery. You can’t do any business from there.

I’ve only had two rules. Do all you can and do it the best you can. It’s the only way you ever get that feeling of accomplishing something.

You got to like your work. You have got to like what you are doing, you have got to be doing something worthwhile so you can like it – because it is worthwhile, that it makes a difference, don’t you see?

One has to remember that every failure can be a stepping stone to something better.

People are just like farm equipment. They rust out quicker than they wear out.

Feed the poor and get rich or feed the rich and get poor.

Hard work beats all the tonics and vitamins in the world.

I just say the moral out of my life is don’t quit at age 65, maybe your boat hasn’t come in yet. Mine hadn’t.

I was sixty-six years old. I still had to make a living. I looked at my social security check of 105 dollars and decided to use that to try to franchise my chicken recipe. Folks had always liked my chicken.

Work is the basis of living. I’ll never retire. A man’ll rust out quicker than he’ll wear out.

Someone has said that there are four things necessary in studying the Bible: Admit, submit, commit and transmit.

I read a lot when I’m travelling and always have a couple of books on the go.

You can only learn so much from books. You can only learn so much from education. Ultimately, it is the wisdom of God that will carry you through in the toughest situations of life.

I like being at home with my music and my books. I’ve done all the partying, I’ve done enough partying for four or five people as a young fella. But now I like the quiet life.

A book should be luminous not voluminous.

Everybody does have a book in them, but in most cases that’s where it should stay.

If it is a distinction to have written a good book, it is also a disgrace to have written a bad one.

My dream is to put together a performance of the evolution of black music with Cirque du Soleil . I would also like to do street opera and children’s books. But even as I work toward these things, I want to simplify my life.