“The first recipe for happiness is: avoid too lengthy meditation on the past.”

Without a family, man, alone in the world, trembles with the cold.

No one can be profoundly original who does not avoid eccentricity.

If you value a man’s regard, strive with him. As to liking, you like your newspaper – and despise it.

Conversation would be vastly improved by the constant use of four simple words: I do not know.

We owe to the Middle Ages the two worst inventions of humanity – romantic love and gunpowder.

Modesty and unselfishness – these are the virtues which men praise – and pass by.

If men could regard the events of their own lives with more open minds, they would frequently discover that they did not really desire the things they failed to obtain.

In literature as in love, we are astonished at what is chosen by others.

A happy marriage is a long conversation which always seems too short.

The really great novel tends to be the exact negative of its author’s life.

Business is a combination of war and sport.

The most important quality in a leader is that of being acknowledged as such. All leaders whose fitness is questioned are clearly lacking in force.

Self-pity comes so naturally to all of us.

To be witty is not enough. One must possess sufficient wit to avoid having too much of it.

An artist must be a reactionary. He has to stand out against the tenor of the age and not go flopping along.

Growing old is no more than a bad habit which a busy person has no time to form.

When one first seeks the truth, one separates oneself from it.

That’s not an accident that Donald Trump didn’t begin with, say, trade or jobs or anything, that he actually began by otherizing the first African-American president of the United States.

I played Mary at the age of seven in my first nativity play, and I loved it – there is something so fascinating about embodying someone else.

Everybody takes at least 20, so even if you see a good selfie, it probably wasn’t the first one. So my tip is to just not take it too seriously and have fun.

The audience is your first collaborator with the material. If that makes sense.

Time cures you first, and then it kills you.

I was first in my class at Johns Hopkins, so?” Make statements, with your actions and your voice.

But when you first embark on the Path, your awareness won’t be focused. You’re likely to see all sorts of strange, dreamlike scenes. But you shouldn’t doubt that all such scenes come from your own mind and nowhere else.