I should like to abolish funerals; the time to mourn a person is at his birth, not his death.

It is necessary from the very nature of things that power should be a check to power.

The deterioration of every government begins with the decay of the principles on which it was founded.

We receive three educations, one from our parents, one from our school-masters, and one from the world. The third contradicts all that the first two teach us.

There is no crueler tyranny than that which is perpetuated under the shield of law and in the name of justice.

Every man who has power is impelled to abuse it.

In the state of nature... all men are born equal, but they cannot continue in this equality. Society makes them lose it, and they recover it only by the protection of the law.

A nation may lose its liberties in a day and not miss them in a century.

For a country, everything will be lost when the jobs of an economist and a banker become highly respected professions.

Liberty... is there only when there is no abuse of power.

Knowledge humanizes mankind, and reason inclines to mildness; but prejudices eradicate every tender disposition.

Even painful memories are ties that bind.

The wife of a careless man is almost a widow.

When I was at drama school I wanted to do classical theatre. It just so happened that I did a film when I came out and I moved that way.

The joy of life is made up of obscure and seemingly mundane victories that give us our own small satisfactions.

Anti-European politicians tell more myths and fantasies about Europe than you can find in Harry Potter or The Da Vinci Code.

I started going back and forth, New York, London, New York, London. I wasn't looking back at all. I was doing tons of jobs. Working, working, working, working.

I never write anything down. I write onstage.

Before you write - remember that every speech has something of 'you' in the writing. Don't take that away when you write. Be yourself. Be comfortable in your own skin.

If there was no black man there would be no Rock'n'Roll. The beat, the rhythms of Africa are what created Rock'n'Roll and Jazz.

The music was always the thing that has been in our world.