“A mule will labor ten years willingly and patiently for you, for the privilege of kicking you once.”

Writing a first draft is like trying to build a house in a strong wind.

All of us failed to match our dreams of perfection. So I rate us on the base of our splendid failure to do the impossible.

No matter how young you are or how old you have got. Not for kudos and not for cash: your picture in the paper nor money in the back either. Just refuse to bear them.

They say that it is the practiced liar who can deceive. But so often the practiced and chronic liar deceives only himself; it is the man who all his life has been selfconvicted of veracity whose lies find quickest credence.

Never be afraid to raise your voice for honesty and truth and compassion against injustice and lying and greed.

A man. All men. He will pass up a hundred chances to do good for one chance to meddle where meddling is not wanted. He will overlook and fail to see chances, opportunities, for riches and fame and welldoing, and even sometimes for evil. But he won’t fail to see a chance to meddle.

There is no such thing as bad whiskey. Some whiskeys just happen to be better than others. But a man shouldn’t fool with booze until he’s fifty; then he’s a damn fool if he doesn’t.

It takes two people to make you, and one people to die. That’s how the world is going to end.

If people all over the world…would do this, it would change the earth.

So, never be afraid. Never be afraid to raise your voice for honesty and truth and compassion, against injustice and lying and greed.

The best fiction is far more true than any journalism.

The quotidian demands of life distract from this resonance of images and events, but some of us feel it always.

I know now that what makes a fool is an inability to take even his own good advice.

If there is a God what the hell is He for?

Some things you must always be unable to bear. Some things you must never stop refusing to bear. Injustice and outrage and dishonor and shame.

He must train himself in ruthless intolerance-that is to throw away anything that is false no matter how much he might love that page or that paragraph.

I want to have my kicks before the whole shithouse goes up in flames.

Reckless adventure is the fool’s hazard.

I am president now, and tired of being kicked around.

It definitely changed the game. I happen to be in the game around [the time] when the internet kicked in.

I swim like a fish and I have an amazing kick.

Sex is kicking death in the ass while singing.

For there is no defense for a man who, in the excess of his wealth, has kicked the great altar of Justice out of sight.

Sometimes you’ve got to kick your heels off and sit down a minute, so you can be ready for your next step!