After having thus successively taken each member of the community in its powerful grasp, and fashioned them at will, the supreme power then extends its arm over the whole community. It covers the surface of society with a network of small complicated rules, minute and uniform, through which the most original minds and the most energetic characters cannot penetrate, to rise above the crowd. The will of man is not shattered, but softened, bent, and guided: men are seldom forced by it to act, but they are constantly restrained from acting: such a power does not destroy, but it prevents existence; it does not tyrannize, but it compresses, enervates, extinguishes, and stupefies a people, till each nation is reduced to nothing better than a flock of timid and industrious animals, of which the government is the shepherd.

I saw old Autumn in the misty morn stand shadowless like silence, listening to silence.

Thomas Hood

If you're not gonna tell the truth, then why start talking?

Gene Wilder

The feminine mystique has succeeded in burying millions of American women alive.

Betty Friedan

Stand-up is like a row boat: it's fun and romantic when you're choosing to do it. But if you have no other choice than to be in a row boat it's not as enjoyable that's survival.

Demetri Martin

So long as war is the main business of nations, temporary despotism - despotism during the campaign - is indispensable.

Walter Bagehot

Feminism is an entire world view or gestalt, not just a laundry list of women's issues.

Charlotte Bunch

Plenty of people miss their share of happiness, not because they never found it, but because they didn't stop to enjoy it.

William Feather

People assume when my hair is long, that I'm a lot cooler than I actually am. I'm not opposed to this misconception.

Malcom Gladwell

Sitting at the table during Color Purple and looking up and suddenly realizing I was acting in front of Steven Spielberg, was pretty cool. It was pretty good.

Whoopi Goldberg

Social values in general are incrementally variable: neither safety, diversity, rational articulation, nor morality is categorically a good thing to have more of, without limits. All are subject to diminishing returns, and ultimately negative returns.

Thomas Sowell

When you have a good mother and no father, God kind of sits in. It's not enough, but it helps.

Dick Gregory

What's the first thing I do when I wake up in the morning? Wish I hadn't.

Steven Patrick Morrissey