I was quite a shy child. I would get terribly nervous and throw up before my birthday party. And then I would be fine. I feel the same now. I get nervous, then it's fine.

To dare to live alone is the rarest courage; since there are many who had rather meet their bitterest enemy in the field, than their own hearts in their closet.

Charles Caleb Colton, Lacon, 182

A good politician is quite as unthinkable as an honest burglar.

H. L. Mencken

Who tells the truth needs no fancy phrases.

Isaac Leib Peretz

What do I care about the purring of one who cannot love, like the cat?

Friedrich Nietzsche

Racing takes everything you've got -- intellectually, emotionally, physically -- and then you have to find about ten percent more and use that too.

Janet Guthrie

Nobody can misunderstand a boy like his own mother. Mothers at present can bring children into the world, but this performance is apt to mark the end of their capacities. They can't even attend to the elementary animal requirements of their offspring. It is quite surprising how many children survive in spite of their mothers.

Norman Douglas

For it would seem - her case proved it - that we write, not with the fingers, but with the whole person. The nerve which controls the pen winds itself about every fibre of our being, threads the heart, pierces the liver.

Virginia Woolf

To understand the nature of the people one must be a prince, and to understand the nature of the prince, one must be of the people.

Niccolo Machiavelli

I just try to play music from my heart and bring as much beauty as I can to as many people as I can. Just give them other alternatives, especially people who aren't exposed to creative music.

Charlie Haden

But if you will not take this Counsel, and persist in thinking a Commerce with the Sex inevitable, then I repeat my former Advice, that in all your Amours you should prefer old Women to young ones. You call this a Paradox, and demand my Reasons. They are these:1. Because as they have more Knowledge of the World and their Minds are better stor'd with Observations, their Conversation is more improving and more lastingly agreable.2. Because when Women cease to be handsome, they study to be good. To maintain their Influence over Men, they supply the Diminution of Beauty by an Augmentation of Utility. They learn to do a 1000 Services small and great, and are the most tender and useful of all Friends when you are sick. Thus they continue amiable. And hence there is hardly such a thing to be found as an old Woman who is not a good Woman.3. Because there is no hazard of Children, which irregularly produc'd may be attended with much Inconvenience.4. Because thro' more Experience, they are more prudent and discreet in conducting an Intrigue to prevent Suspicion. The Commerce with them is therefore safer with regard to your Reputation. And with regard to theirs, if the Affair should happen to be known, considerate People might be rather inclin'd to excuse an old Woman who would kindly take care of a young Man, form his Manners by her good Counsels, and prevent his ruining his Health and Fortune among mercenary Prostitutes.5. Because in every Animal that walks upright, the Deficiency of the Fluids that fill the Muscles appears first in the highest Part: The Face first grows lank and wrinkled; then the Neck; then the Breast and Arms; the lower Parts continuing to the last as plump as ever: So that covering all above with a Basket, and regarding2 only what is below the Girdle, it is impossible of two Women to know an old from a young one. And as in the dark all Cats are grey, the Pleasure of corporal Enjoyment with an old Woman is at least equal, and frequently superior, every Knack being by Practice capable of Improvement.6.

Benjamin Franklin

What is conservatism? It is not adherence to the old and tried, but against the new and untried?

Abraham Lincoln

Difficulties should act as a tonic. They should spur us to greater exertion.

B. C. Forbes