“In every government there are three sorts of power: the legislative; the executive in respect to things dependent on the law of nations; and the executive in regard to matters that depend on the civil law.”

Never create by law what can be accomplished by morality.

Countries are well cultivated, not as they are fertile, but as they are free.

I should like to abolish funerals; the time to mourn a person is at his birth, not his death.

Coffee renders many foolish people temporarily capable of wise actions

The public business must be carried on with a certain motion, neither too quick nor too slow.

To become truly great, one has to stand with people, not above them.

There is no one, says another, whom fortune does not visit once in his life; but when she does not find him ready to receive her, she walks in at the door, and flies out at the window.

Honor is unknown in despotic states.

Honor sets all the parts of the body politic in motion, and by its very action connects them; thus each individual advances the public good, while he only thinks of promoting his own interest.

The mood and temper of the public in regard to the treatment of crime and criminals is one of the most unfailing tests of the civilisation of any country.

There are bad examples which are worse than crimes; and more states have perished from the violation of morality than from the violation of law.

What orators lack in depth they make up for in length.

Law should be like death, which spares no one.

Wherever I find envy I take a pleasure in provoking it: I always praise before an envious man those who make him grow pale.

There should be weeping at a man’s birth, not at his death.

When the body of the people is possessed of the supreme power, it is called a democracy.

There are three things that are not to be credited: a woman when she weeps, a merchant when he swears, nor a drunkard when he prays.

I really focused on three things in high school – my company, basketball and my school work.

One of my great all-time loves in cinema, and I’ve seen it three times, is Bondarchuk’s ‘War and Peace.’ Not a lot of people may have seen that film. It was made during the Soviet era.

You know, when I did ‘American Idol’ the three times, I tried to tell these kids you have to tell the story of the lyric.

Both morally and practically, segregation is to me a basic injustice. Since I believe it to be so, I must attempt to remove it.

I was super skeptical about doing TV. I said no three times, part of which was confidence because I didn’t really understand that world. I know how to climb mountains and do all that, but I wasn’t a TV person.

Students, when you want to say something, think about it three times before you say it. Speak only if your words will benefit yourselves and others. Do not speak if it brings no benefit.

I said no to the Born Survivor producer three times because I’ve never aspired to be a TV man.