From time to time there appear on the face of the earth men of rare and consummate excellence, who dazzle us by their virtue, and whose outstanding qualities shed a stupendous light. Like those extraordinary stars of whose origins we are ignorant, and of whose fate, once they have vanished, we know even less, such men have neither forebears nor descendants: they are the whole of their race.

Acting serves as the quintessential social lubricant and a device for protecting our interests and gaining advantage in every aspect of life.

Marlon Brando

Ninety-nine percent of who you are is invisible and untouchable.

Richard Buckminster Fuller

We are like a woman with a difficult pregnancy. We have to rebuild the social classes in Egypt, and we must change the way things were.

Naguib Mahfouz

What a curious picture it is to find man, homo sapiens, of divine origin, we are told, seriously considering going underground to escape the consequences of his own folly. With a little wisdom and foresight, surely it is not yet necessary to forsake life in the fresh air and in the warmth of the sunlight. What a paradox if our own cleverness in science should force us to live underground with the moles.

J. William Fulbright

Don't overestimate the decency of the human race.

H. L. Mencken

Fear is the main source of superstition, and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom, in the pursuit of truth as in the endeavour after a worthy manner of life.

Bertrand Russell

Though it is very important for man as an individual that his religion should be true, that is not the case for society. Society has nothing to fear or hope from another life; what is most important for it is not that all citizens profess the true religion but that they should profess religion.

Alexis de Tocqueville

I think that great poetry is the most interesting and complex use of the poet's language at that point in history, and so it's even more exciting when you read a poet like Yeats, almost 100 years old now, and you think that perhaps no one can really top that.

Diane Wakoski

The only power deserving the name is that of masses, and of governments while they make themselves the organ of the tendencies and instincts of masses.

John Stuart Mill

Melancholy were the sounds on a winter's night.

Virginia Woolf

Everybody hates a prodigy, detests an old head on young shoulders.

Desiderius Erasmus

Perhaps there is no greater issue facing contemporary women than the choices they must make about balancing home and work.

Camille Paglia