The more a man knows, the more he forgives.

Happiness and unhappiness are in the heart and spirit of each one of us: If you feel unhappy, then place yourself above that and act so that your happiness does not get to be dependent on anything.

You philosophers are lucky men. You write on paper and paper is patient. Unfortunate Empress that I am, I write on the susceptible skins of living beings.

In politics a capable ruler must be guided by circumstances, conjectures and conjunctions.

Nothing is more difficult, in my opinion, than to avoid something that fundamentally attracts you.

A great wind is blowing, and that gives you either imagination or a headache.

I sincerely want peace, not because I lack resources for war, but because I hate bloodshed.

One does not always do the best there is. One does the best one can.

it is better to inspire a reform than to enforce it.

Power without a nation's confidence is nothing.

I am one of the people who love the why of things.

This universe is a dancing stage for consciousness.

She was strangely unaware that she could look and see freshly for herself, as she wrote, without primary regard for what had been said before.

We will either find a way or make one.

I worked with Steven Spielberg on Amistad... he seemed so very secure in himself that he let me do things.

Always be a beginner at something, and always be in love with what you are beginning.

Science is merely an extremely powerful method of winnowing what's true from what feels good.

I started doing yoga.

The possibility that empathy resides in parts of the brain so ancient that we share them with rats should give pause to anyone comparing politicians with those poor, underestimated creatures.

What rare days were those, When my chief duty was to write a song.

In its sentimental mode, compassion is an exercise in moral indignation, in feeling good rather than doing good ... In its unsentimental mode, compassion seeks above all to do good.