Life has taught me to think, but thinking has not taught me to live.

What breadth, what beauty and power of human nature and development there must be in a woman to get over all the palisades, all the fences, within which she is held captive!

History is the autobiography of a madman.

There is nothing in the world more stubborn than a corpse: you can hit it, you can knock it to pieces, but you cannot convince it.

To build a city where it is impossible to build a city is madness in itself, but to build there one of the most elegant and grandest of cities is the madness of genius.

It is possible to lead astray an entire generation, to strike it blind, to drive it insane, to direct it towards a false goal. Napoleon proved this.

The liberty of the individual is the greatest thing of all, it is on this and this alone that the true will of the people can develop.

The world will not know liberty until all that is religious and political is transformed into something simple and human and made susceptible to criticism and denial.

Science, which cuts its way through the muddy pond of daily life without mingling with it, casts its wealth to right and left, but the puny boatmen do not know how to fish for it.

Would it be possible to stand still on one spot more majestically -- while simulating a triumphant march forward -- than it is done by the two English Houses of Parliament?

Liberalism, austere in political trifles, has learned ever more artfully to unite a constant protest against the government with a constant submission to it.

It's not just enough to change the players. We've gotta change the game.

We often feel paralyzed by choice and make no choice. But the thing is, no choice is a choice. If you’re not doing something about it, you’re doing something about it.

It's horrible, horrible, horrible. It took a year and a half until I found out that I had post-natal depression.

The millions or billions of micro decisions that you're going to make, that's what will determine who you are as a writer, not you deciding in advance.

We have for years been building a society in which everybody plunders everybody, and while we are weary of being plundered, we enjoy the plunder.

Film, therefore, is part of society, not distant from it, easy to experience for people regardless of class.

Since Democrats vs. Republicans has been obliterated, no real difference between parties.

I've lived with pressure all my life. I enjoy it.

And weep the more, because I weep in vain.

If anyone can show me ... that there is any reason - other than fear - to believe in any version of an afterlife, I'll give you my piano, one of my legs, and my wife.