“Never depend upon institutions or government to solve any problem. All social movements are founded by, guided by, motivated and seen through by the passion of individuals.”

Fathers are biological necessities, but social accidents.

I do not believe in using women in combat, because females are too fierce.

Our first and most pressing problem is how to do away with warfare as a method of solving conflicts between national groups within a society who have different views about how the society is to run.

Every time we liberate a woman, we liberate a man.

Sometimes, instead of helping people to advance, a discovery or an invention holds them back.

Blackberry winter, the time when the hoarforst lies on the blackberry blossoms; without this frost the berries will not set. It is the forerunner of a rich harvest.

The pains of childbirth were altogether different from the enveloping effects of other kinds of pain. These were pains one could follow with one’s mind.

Women have an important contribution to make.

Young people are moving away from feeling guilty about sleeping with somebody to feeling guilty if they are *not* sleeping with someone.

Somehow, we have to get older people back close to growing children if we are to restore a sense of community, acquire knowledge of the past, and provide a sense of the future.

Through a grandmother’s voice and hands the end of life is known at the beginning.

There is no lonelier person than the one who lives with a spouse with whom he or she cannot communicate.

Don’t depend on governments or corporations to fix problems. Social revolutions are led by passionate individuals and that’s what makes the difference.

The way in which each human infant is transformed into the finished adult, into the complicated individual version of his city and his century is one of the most fascinating studies open to the curious minded.

One of the most dangerous things that can happen to a child is to kill or torture an animal and get away with it.

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.

Far from being the product of a democratic revolution and of an opposition to English institutions, the constitution of the United States was the result of a powerful reaction against democracy, and in favor of the traditions of the mother country.

How to save the old that’s worth saving, whether in landscape, houses, manners, institutions, or human types, is one of our greatest problems, and the one that we bother least about.

The most extraordinary, the most bizarre acts, those which most arrantly seem to conflict with every law, every human institution.

With the right kind of institutions, starting with the rule of law, Burma could progress very quickly.

Are we going to permit a continuing decline in public and private morality or re-establish high ethical standards as the means of regaining a diminishing faith in the integrity of our public and private institutions?

Part of our struggle is to make the international community understand that we are a poor country not because there is an insufficiency of resources and investment, but because we are deprived of the basic institutions and practices that make for good government.

A revolution which aims merely at changing official policies and institutions with a view to an improvement in material conditions has little chance of genuine success.

I have this thing about being acknowledged and accepted by institutions.