“We are sure to be losers when we quarrel with ourselves; it is civil war.”

Body and mind, like man and wife, do not always agree to die together.

The head of dullness, unlike the tail of the torpedo, loses nothing of the benumbing and lethargizing influence by reiterated discharges.

The study of mathematics, like the Nile, begins in minuteness but ends in magnificence.

If you are under obligations to many, it is prudent to postpone the recompensing of one, until it be in your power to remunerate all; otherwise you will make more enemies by what you give, than by what you withhold.

It is not every man that can afford to wear a shabby coat.

Taking things not as they ought to be, but as they are, I fear it must be allowed that Macchiavelli will always have more disciples than Jesus.

Examinations are formidable even to the best prepared, for the greatest fool may ask more than the wisest man can answer.

He that can enjoy the intimacy of the great, and on no occasion disgust them by familiarity, or disgrace himself by servility, proves that he is as perfect a gentleman by nature as his companions are by rank.

It is easier to pretend to be what you are not than to hide what you really are; but he that can accomplish both has little to learn in hypocrisy.

We may anticipate bliss, but who ever drank of that enchanted cup unalloved?

We know the effects of many things, but the cause of few; experience, therefore, is a surer guide than imagination, and inquiry than conjecture.

There are prating coxcombs in the world who would rather talk than listen, although Shakespeare himself were the orator, and human nature the theme!

Falsehood is often rocked by truth, but she soon outgrows her cradle and discards her nurse.

The present time has one advantage over every other — it is our own.

Hurry is the mark of a weak mind, dispatch of a strong one.

Pain may be said to follow pleasure as its shadow; but the misfortune is that in this particular case, the substance belongs to the shadow, the emptiness to its cause.

I’m a statistic in a system that a civil servant dominates.

I think everybody should get married. Boys and girls. Girls and boys. Boys and boys! Girls and girls! Shouldn’t we all be entitled to a family-Civil rights baby it’s civil rights. It doesn’t get any better here in Berkeley I’ll tell you that.

We need to defend our principles and values, human rights, civil liberties and the rule of international law. If we don’t our world will further descend into a state of chaos.

When and under what conditions is the black man to have a free ballot? When is he in fact to have those full civil rights which have so long been his in law?

Civil marriage, like all civil rights provided by the government, must be provided equally to all Americans.

What on earth could be more luxurious than a sofa, a book, and a cup of coffee?…Was ever anything so civil?

As for civil liberties, any one who is not vigilant may one day find himself living, if not in a police state, at least in a police city.

Civil disobedience is – it’s no fun.