May we agree that private life is irrelevant? Multiple, mixed, ambiguous at best -- out of it we try to fashion the crystal clear, the singular, the absolute, and that is what is relevant; that is what matters.

It is sad, no doubt, to exhaust one's strength and one's days in cleaving the bosom of this jealous earth, which compels us to wring from it the treasures of its fertility, when a bit of the blackest and coarsest bread is, at the end of the day's work, the sole recompense and the sole profit attaching to so arduous a toil.

George Sand

I write the vocals last, because I wanted to invent the music first and push the music to the level that I had to compete against it.

Axl Rose

A politician thinks of the next election. A statesman, of the next generation.

James Freeman Clarke

For want of a Nail the Shoe was lost; for want of a Shoe the Horse was lost; and for want of a Horse the Rider was lost; being overtaken and slain by the Enemy, all for want of Care about a Horse-shoe Nail.

Benjamin Franklin

Here at lastWe shall be free;the Almighty hath not builtHere for his envy, will not drive us hence:Here we may reign secure, and in my choiceTo reign is worth ambition though in Hell:Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heaven.

John Milton, Paradise Lost

A man of strength and wisdom, John Paul became an inspiration to generations of both Catholics and non-Catholics throughout the world by encouraging freedom, promoting peace and respecting all faiths.

Greg Walden

I know many writers who first dictate passages, then polish what they have dictated. I speak, then I polish - occasionally I do windows.

Edward Koch

The loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind.

Oliver Goldsmith

The genius of Man in our time has gone into jet-propulsion, atom-splitting, penicillin-curing, etc. There is none over for works of imagination; of spiritual insight or mystical enlightenment. I asked for bread and was given a tranquilizer. It is important to recognize that in our time man has not written one word, thought one thought, put two notes or two bricks together, splashed color on to canvas or concrete into space, in a manner which will be of any conceivable imaginative interest to posterity.

Malcolm Muggeridge

A hundred times every day I remind myself that my inner and outer life depend on the labors of other men, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give in the same measure as I have received and am still receiving.

Albert Einstein

In the West, audiences think I am a stereotyped action star, or that I always play hitmen or killers. But in Hong Kong, I did a lot of comedy, many dramatic films, and most of all, romantic roles, lots of love stories. I was like a romance novel hero.

Chow Yun-Fat

No matter how good you get you can always get better and that's the exciting part.

Tiger Woods