You will find the Americans much as the Greeks found the Romans: great, big, vulgar, bustling people more vigorous than we are and also more idle, with more unspoiled virtues but also more corrupt.

A man who trusts nobody is apt to be the kind of man nobody trusts.

Too many people live too much in the past. The past must be a springboard, not a sofa.

The wind of change is blowing through the continent. Whether we like it or not, this growth of national consciousness is a political fact.

Most of our people have never had it so good.

It has been said that there is no fool like an old fool, except a young fool. But the young fool has first to grow up to be an old fool to realize what a damn fool he was when he was a young fool.

I have learned that in all negotiations nothing matters except the will to reach agreement.

If you don't believe in God, all you have to believe in is decency. Decency is very good. Better decent than indecent. But I don't think it's enough.

Memorial services are the cocktail parties of the geriatric set.

History is apt to judge harshly those who sacrifice tomorrow for today.

I'd like that translated, if I may.

Hope attracts chances.

To worship a sacred mystery was just to worship your own ignorance.

Bedtime is daytime, and we come into bloom after midnight.

It is the house of my dreams. My Tuscan dream! [Every Italophile's dream]

A lot of the girls my age were impressed by silly stuff like money and fame. I wanted to be able to have intellectual and spiritual conversations with someone who was on the same page as me.

The people have nothing to do with the laws but to obey them.

You fail only if you stop writing.

Two thousand years ago, five thousand, they didn't have a word for imagination, and faith was the best they could come up with for a pretty solemn bunch of followers.

I don't presume to think I'm great at anything.

God created us to thrive on encouragement from others