If the sight of the blue skies fills you with joy, if a blade of grass springing up in the fields has power to move you, if the simple things of nature have a message that you understand, rejoice, for your soul is alive.

True happiness is to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future, not to amuse ourselves with either hopes or fears but to rest satisfied with what we have, which is sufficient, for he that is so wants nothing. The great blessings of mankind are within us and within our reach. A wise man is content with his lot, whatever it may be, without wishing for what he has not.

Seneca (Seneca the Elder)

'I will have no man in my boat,' said Starbuck, 'who is not afraid of a whale.' By this, he seemed to mean not only that the most reliable and useful courage was that which arises from the fair estimation of the encountered peril, but that an utterly fearless man is a far more dangerous comrade than a coward.

Herman Melville, Moby Dick

I was in Paris at an English-language bookstore. I picked up a volume of Dickinson's poetry. I came back to my hotel, read 2,000 of her poems and immediately began composing in my head. I wrote down the melodies even before I got to a piano.

Gordon Getty

I'm a private person too, and we don't ever film anything in our home because it's off limits. It's like letting people see your messy house.

Carrie Underwood

Constantly choosing the lesser of two evils is still choosing evil.

Jerry Garcia

I just want to continue to break barriers and to show the industry and the world that beauty is diverse, and you don't have to be a certain stereotype to be beautiful.

Joan Smalls

You ask me if I keep a notebook to record my great ideas. I've only ever had one.

Albert Einstein

I talk democracy to these men and women. I tell them that they have the vote, and that theirs is the kingdom and the power and the glory. I say to them You are supreme: exercise your power. They say, That's right: tell us what to do; and I tell them. I say Exercise our vote intelligently by voting for me. And they do. That's democracy; and a splendid thing it is too for putting the right men in the right place.

George Bernard Shaw

I love technology. We can be our own DJs wherever we go.

Ludacris

Where defining foreign policy as 'ethical' went wrong was that it implied that all decisions would be exclusive in every respect of any dealings with unethical regimes.

William Hague

When all is said and done, the real citadel of strength of any community is in the hearts and minds and desires of those who dwell there.

Everett Dirksen

My mom had me when she was 16, and I was an only child, which is probably why I received a lot of love and didn't miss that my father wasn't around.

Brett Ratner