“Life and love go on, let the music play.”

You have to be what you are. Whatever you are, you gotta be it.

Life is – the way God has given it to me was just a platter – a golden platter of life laid out there for me. It’s been beautiful.

When I’m gone I’ll be remembered as the workin’ man who put his point across with a right hand full of knuckles.

You build on failure. You use it as a stepping stone. Close the door on the past. You don’t try to forget the mistakes, but you don’t dwell on it. You don’t let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space.

Deep in the heart of the infinite darkness, a tiny blue marble is spinning through space. Born in the splendor of God’s holy vision, and sliding away like a tear down his face.

When God forgave me, I figured I’d better do it too.

Prisoners are the greatest audience that an entertainer can perform to.

Inside the walls of a prison my body may be, but my Lord has set my soul free.

Gospel music was the thing that inspired me as a child growing up on a cotton farm, where work was drudgery and it was so hard that when I was in the field I sang all the time.

I found out that there weren’t too many limitations, if I did it my way.

We’ll all be equal under the grass, and God’s got a heaven for country trash.

You’ve got to know your limitations. I don’t know what your limitations are. I found out what mine were when I was twelve. I found out that there weren’t too many limitations, if I did it my way.

I’m not bitter. Why should I be bitter? I’m thrilled to death with life.

There’s a lot of things blamed on me that never happened. But then, there’s a lot of things that I did that I never got caught at.

Death and hell are never full, and neither are men’s eyes.

I knew that when I left there at the age of 18, I wouldn’t be back. And it was common knowledge among all the people there that when you graduate from high school here, you go to college or go get a job or something and do it on your own.

If you are going to get anywhere in life you have to read a lot of books.

Time, as it grows old, teaches all things.

What ever fortune brings, don’t be afraid of doing things.

For those who fight for it life has a flavor the sheltered will never know.

My piece of bread only belongs to me when I know that everyone else has a share, and that no one starves while I eat.

The unexpected has happened so continually in my life that it has ceased to deserve the name.

Fixing your heartbreak by getting into another relationship is not the way to live your life – you need to live it on your terms for a while.

You can’t live your life for other people. You’ve got to do what’s right for you, even if it hurts some people you love.