It is a very inconvenient habit of kittens (Alice had once made the remark) that whatever you say to them, they always purr.

If I were not Alexander, I would be Diogenes.

Alexander the Great

In life there are good and bad situations. But when you are down in the valley looking up at the mountain, sometimes you realize that you can see the stars a little clearer. You realize what's truly important and you know exactly what must be done to keep it just like it is.

Jennifer Megan Varnadore

Conservation and rural-life policies are really two sides of the same policy; and down at bottom this policy rests upon the fundamental law that neither man nor nation can prosper unless, in dealing with the present, thought is steadily taken for the future.

Theodore Roosevelt

Twenty-five years ago, while an undergraduate at Stanford, I got a job on campus as a lifeguard, deepening a love of swimming and water that has lasted throughout my life. I took the duties seriously and studied the swimmers with professional vigilance, relieved at the end of each day that no emergency rescue had been required. But the greatest challenge of the job was standing poolside in a bathing suit with my body on display.Work began in the locker room, where I changed into my Speedo and surveyed my reflection, assessing what would be on view for the next few hours. I was plagued by self-criticism. I imagined the swimmers judging my shape, until I made myself remember that I was there to guard their lives, not their fantasies. Later I performed my variation of the same ablutions everyone else did, showering and hair washing, the application of lotion and makeup -- preparations for re-entering the other world of walking upright on solid land.

Elizabeth Rosner, "The New York

Deciding whether or not to trust a person is like deciding whether or not to climb a tree because you might get a wonderful view from the highest branch or you might simply get covered in sap and for this reason many people choose to spend their time alone and indoors where it is harder to get a splinter.

Lemony Snicket

The public school has become the established church of secular society.

Ivan Illich

Will an Iraq war make our Al Qaeda problem worse? Not likely.

Christopher Hitchens

You never fail until you stop trying.

Albert Einstein

The road to excess leads to the palace of wisdom.

William Blake

Laughter -- An interior convulsion, producing a distortion of the features and accompanied by inarticulate noises. It is infectious and, though intermittent, incurable.

Ambrose Bierce

Whether a woman's running for office or she's supporting her husband who's running for office and she gets criticised for wearing open-toed shoes or for the colour of her coat, there's just a lot of history that you bear if you are a woman who puts herself out in the political arena.

Hillary Clinton

Unlike any other leader in modern American history, we are led today by a president that has decided to pit Americans against each other.

Marco Rubio