“The validity of a tax depends upon its nature, and not upon its name.”

We seek to find peace of mind in the word, the formula, the ritual. The hope is illusion.

With traps and obstacles and hazards confronting us on every hand, only blindness or indifference will fail to turn in all humility, for guidance or for warning, to the study of examples.

Consequences cannot alter statutes, but may help to fix their meaning.

It is for ordinary minds, not for psychoanalysts, that our rules of evidence are framed. They have their source very often in considerations of administrative convenience, or practical expediency, and not in rules of logic.

Every human being of adult years and sound mind has a legal right to determine what shall be done with his own body.

The risk to be percieved defines the duty to be obeyed.

The great tides and currents which engulf the rest of men do not turn aside in their course and pass the judges by.

Code is followed by commentary, and commentary by revision, and thus the task is never done.

Not honesty alone, but the punctilio of an honor the most sensitive, is then the standard of behavior.

Fraud includes the pretense of knowledge when knowledge there is none.

The great ideals of liberty and equality are preserved against the assaults of opportunism, the expediency of the passing hour, the erosion of small encroachments, the scorn and derision of those who have no patience with general principles.

Rest and motion, unrelieved and unchecked, are equally destructive.

No judicial system could do society’s work if each issue had to be decided afresh in every case which raised it.

Justice is not to be taken by storm. She is to be wooed by slow advances.

In truth, I am nothing but a plodding mediocrity – please observe, a plodding mediocrity – for a mere mediocrity does not go very far, but a plodding one gets quite a distance. There is joy in that success, and a distinction can come from courage, fidelity and industry.

The heroic hours of life do not announce their presence by drum and trumpet.

In Hollywood a starlet is the name for any woman under thirty who is not actively employed in a brothel.

I’ve been described as a tough and noisy woman, a prize fighter, a man-hater, you name it. They call me Battling Bella, Mother Courage, and a Jewish mother with more complaints than Portnoy.

The name Bei Dao was actually given to me with the help of friends. When we were publishing our unofficial magazine, Today, we wanted to avoid being harassed by the police so we were trying to think of names that we could use. It was done very casually.

I was christened Edward. My sister gave me the name Bear when I was a week old and it has stuck.

I love myself. Anything that has my name I’m tickled to death.

The most effective way to build a brand is not by spending millions in advertising, but by finding a clever way to keep your name in the press.

We are born seekers, calling strange names into the darkness from our earliest days because we know we are not meant to be alone, and because we know that we await someone whom we cannot always see.

Name and date split in soft slate a few months obliterate. 166