Without adventure, civilization is in full decay.

With Congress, every time they make a joke it's a law; and every time they make a law it's a joke.

Traffic signals in New York are just rough guidelines.

At ebb tide I wrote a line upon the sand, and gave it all my heart and all my soul. At flood tide I returned to read what I had inscribed and found my ignorance upon the shore.

Let's remind ourselves that last year's fresh idea is today's cliche.

Exceptions prove the rule, and wreck the budget.

If I had a formula for bypassing trouble, I would not pass it around. Trouble creates a capacity to handle it. I don't say embrace trouble; that's as bad as treating it as an enemy. But I do say meet it as a friend, for you'll see a lot of it and y

The trouble is, there is an endless supply of White Men, but there has always been a limited number of Human Beings.

In "King Henry VI, Part II," Shakespeare has Dick Butcher suggest to his fellow anti-establishment rabble-rousers, "The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers." That action may be extreme but a similar sentiment was expressed by Thomas K. Co

If one cannot enjoy reading a book over and over again, there is no use in reading it at all.

I think we are in Rats' Alley where the dead men lost their bones.

So you think that money is the root of all evil. Have you ever asked what is the root of money?

The cable TV sex channels don't expand our horizons, don't make us better people, and don't come in clearly enough.

Do not seek death; death will find you. But seek the road which makes death a fulfillment.

You may my glories and my state dispose, But not my griefs; still am I king of those.

Nothing succeeds like the appearance of success.

Age before beauty; and pearls before swine.

If men are not afraid to die, it is of no avail to threaten them with death. If men live in constant fear of dying, And if breaking the law means a man will be killed, Who will dare to break the law? There is always an official executioner. If

There is no proverb that is not true.

A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices.

If a man has a strong faith he can indulge in the luxury of skepticism.

A man is known by the company he organizes.

We rarely find anyone who can say he has lived a happy life, and who, content with his life, can retire from the world like a satisfied guest.

"I only touch base with reality on an as-needed basis!"

Death is a spirit leaving a body, sort of like a shell leaving the nut behind.

Some men are heterosexual, and some are bisexual, and some men don't think about sex at all... they become lawyers.

General notions are generally wrong.

To listen to some devout people, one would imagine that God never laughs.

No small art is it to sleep: it is necessary for that purpose to keep awake all day.

"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away".

The man who sets out to carry a cat by its tail learns something that will always be useful and which never will grow dim or doubtful.

Prosperity makes friends, adversity tries them.

I am America's child, a spastic slogging on demented limbs drooling I'll trade my PhD for a telephone voice.

Rembrandt is not to be compared in the painting of character with our extraordinarily gifted English artist, Mr. Rippingille.

Praise the sea; on shore remain.

A university is what a college becomes when the faculty loses interest in students.

It is better to have loved and lost

"No job too big; no fee too big!"

Every cloud engenders not a storm.

The ratio of literacy to illiteracy is a constant, but nowadays the illiterates can read.

I don't know anything about music. In my line you don't have to.

I value kindness to human beings first of all, and kindness to animals. I don't respect the law; I have a total irreverence for anything connected with society except that which makes the roads safer, the beer stronger, the food cheaper, and old men

When I first arrived in this country I had only fifteen cents in my pocket and a willingness to compromise.

A likely impossibility is always preferable to an unconvincing possibility.

What makes you think graduate school is supposed to be satisfying?

Tip the world over on its side and everything loose will land in Los Angeles.

Music in the soul can be heard by the universe.

The white race is the cancer of history.

The nearer to the church, the further from God.

Marijuana will be legal some day, because the many law students who now smoke pot will someday become congressmen and legalize it in order to protect themselves.

A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.

Credit ... is the only enduring testimonial to man's confidence in man.

The first Rotarian was the first man to call John the Baptist "Jack."

Let your conscience be your guide.

Writing about music is like dancing about architecture.

Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.

Execute every act of thy life as though it were thy last.

A highly intelligent man should take a primitive woman. Imagine if on top of everything else, I had a woman who interfered with my work.

Reality is bad enough, why should I tell the truth?

The Public is merely a multiplied "me."

The lovely woman-child Kaa was mercilessly chained to the cruel post of the warrior-chief Beast, with his barbarian tribe now stacking wood at her nubile feet, when the strong clear voice of the poetic and heroic Handsomas roared, 'Flick your Bic, cr

Water, taken in moderation cannot hurt anybody.

"The jig's up, Elman." "Which jig?"

"You have been in Afghanistan, I perceive."

A good question is never answered. It is not a bolt to be tightened into place but a seed to be planted and to bear more seed toward the hope of greening the landscape of idea.

Skill without imagination is craftsmanship and gives us many useful objects such as wickerwork picnic baskets. Imagination without skill gives us modern art.

The only promotion rules I can think of are that a sense of shame is to be avoided at all costs and there is never any reason for a hustler to be less cunning than more virtuous men. Oh yes ... whenever you think you've got something really great, a

A journey of a thousand miles starts under one's feet.

So she went into the garden to cut a cabbage leaf to make an apple pie; and at the same time a great she-bear, coming up the street pops its head into the shop. "What! no soap?" So he died, and she very imprudently married the barber; and there were

Suffering alone exists, none who suffer; The deed there is, but no doer thereof; Nirvana is, but no one is seeking it; The Path there is, but none who travel it.

There's no justice in this world.

Governor Tarkin. I should have expected to find you holding Vader's leash. I thought I recognized your foul stench when I was brought on board.

Once harm has been done, even a fool understands it.

A woman takes off her claim to respect along with her garments.

Plots are like girdles. Hidden, they hold your interest; revealed, they're of no interest except to fetishists. Like girdles, they attempt to contain an uncontainable experience.

Prisons are built with stones of Law, brothels with bricks of Religion.

You can never do just one thing.

If you want to know what god thinks of money, just look at the people he gave it to.

It is right that he too should have his little chronicle, his memories, his reason, and be able to recognize the good in the bad, the bad in the worst, and so grow gently old all down the unchanging days and die one day like any other day, only short

I dread success. To have succeeded is to have finished one's business on earth, like the male spider, who is killed by the female the moment he has succeeded in his courtship. I like a state of continual becoming, with a goal in front and not behin

British education is probably the best in the world, if you can survive it. If you can't there is nothing left for you but the diplomatic corps.

IV. The time required for an object to fall twenty stories is greater than or equal to the time it takes for whoever knocked it off the ledge to spiral down twenty flights to attempt to capture it unbroken. Such an object is inevitably price

With Congress, every time they make a joke it's a law; and every time they make a law it's a joke.

I am not afraid of tomorrow, for I have seen yesterday and I love today.

I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach. Oh, tell me that I may s

There is no distinctly native American criminal class except Congress.

Why be a man when you can be a success?

A copy of the universe is not what is required of art; one of the damned things is ample.

The lawgiver, of all beings, most owes the law allegiance. He of all men should behave as though the law compelled him. But it is the universal weakness of mankind that what we are given to administer we presently imagine we own.

"The chain which can be yanked is not the eternal chain."

A man who cannot seduce men cannot save them either.

Unprovided with original learning, unformed in the habits of thinking, unskilled in the arts of composition, I resolved to write a book.

He draweth out the thread of his verbosity finer than the staple of his argument.

Let me assure you that to us here at First National, you're not just a number. Youre two numbers, a dash, three more numbers, another dash and another number.

The major sin is the sin of being born.

The Almighty in His infinite wisdom did not see fit to create Frenchmen in the image of Englishmen.

Small things make base men proud.

Man is the measure of all things.

The capacity of human beings to bore one another seems to be vastly greater than that of any other animals. Some of their most esteemed inventions have no other apparent purpose, for example, the dinner party of more than two, the epic poem, and the

A man gazing at the stars is proverbially at the mercy of the puddles in the road.

It's is not, it isn't ain't, and it's it's, not its, if you mean it is. If you don't, it's its. Then too, it's hers. It isn't her's. It isn't our's either. It's ours, and likewise yours and theirs.

The problem with any unwritten law is that you don't know where to go to erase it.

The Worst Car Hire Service When David Schwartz left university in 1972, he set up Rent-a-wreck as a joke. Being a natural prankster, he acquired a fleet of beat-up shabby, wreckages waiting for the scrap heap in California. He put on a cap and lo

Advertising is a valuable economic factor because it is the cheapest way of selling goods, particularly if the goods are worthless.

Nothing will dispel enthusiasm like a small admission fee.

A good scapegoat is hard to find. A guilty conscience is the mother of invention.

When I have one foot in the grave I will tell the truth about women. I shall tell it, jump into my coffin, pull the lid over me, and say, "Do what you like now."

With Congress, every time they make a joke it's a law; and every time they make a law it's a joke.

I have a simple philosophy: Fill what's empty. Empty what's full. Scratch where it itches.

Don't tell me how hard you work. Tell me how much you get done.

I hate quotations.

Delores breezed along the surface of her life like a flat stone forever skipping along smooth water, rippling reality sporadically but oblivious to it consistently, until she finally lost momentum, sank, and due to an overdose of flouride as a child

If I have to lay an egg for my country, I'll do it.

I stopped believing in Santa Claus when I was six. Mother took me to see him in a department store and he asked for my autograph.

My father, a good man, told me, "Never lose your ignorance; you cannot replace it."

XXVI: If a sufficient number of management layers are superimposed on each other, it can be assured that disaster is not left to chance. XXVII: Rank does not intimidate hardware. Neither does the lack of rank. XXVIII: It is better to be the r

Ed Sullivan will be around as long as someone else has talent.

Marijuana will be legal some day, because the many law students who now smoke pot will someday become congressmen and legalize it in order to protect themselves.

If you have to ask what jazz is, you'll never know.

Hain't we got all the fools in town on our side? And hain't that a big enough majority in any town?

He has not acquired a fortune; the fortune has acquired him.

New York now leads the world's great cities in the number of people around whom you shouldn't make a sudden move.

What good is an obscenity trial except to popularize literature?

Delay not, Caesar. Read it instantly.

Certain passages in several laws have always defied interpretation and the most inexplicable must be a matter of opinion. A judge of the Court of Session of Scotland has sent the editors of this book his candidate which reads, "In the Nuts (unground

It is only the man whose intellect is clouded by his sexual impulse that could give the name of the fair sex to that undersized, narrow-shouldered, broad-hipped, and short-legged race.

If a shameless woman expects to be defiled and then dies of her fierce love because you do not consent, will chastity also be homicide?

Rotten wood cannot be carved.

Nothing endures but change.

What does not destroy me, makes me stronger.

Classical music is the kind we keep thinking will turn into a tune.

We were so poor we couldn't afford a watchdog. If we heard a noise at night, we'd bark ourselves.

When you are about to die, a wombat is better than no company at all.

You can tell the ideals of a nation by its advertisements.

Silence is the element in which great things fashion themselves.

The whole world is a scab. The point is to pick it constructively.

Your wig steers the gig.

We Americans, we're a simple people... but piss us off, and we'll bomb your cities.

Pauca sed matura. [Few but excellent.]

Another day, another dollar.

Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.

I don't have any solution but I certainly admire the problem.

There is no ox so dumb as the orthodox.

The optimist thinks that this is the best of all possible worlds, and the pessimist knows it.

Ever get the feeling that the world's on tape and one of the reels is missing?

Life sucks, but death doesn't put out at all.

In my experience, if you have to keep the lavatory door shut by extending your left leg, it's modern architecture.

In the long run we are all dead.

The universe is made of stories, not of atoms.

If the colleges were better, if they really had it, you would need to get the police at the gates to keep order in the inrushing multitude. See in college how we thwart the natural love of learning by leaving the natural method of teaching what each

A hundred years from now it is very likely that [of Twain's works] "The Jumping Frog" alone will be remembered.

Naked children have never played in _o_u_r fountains, and I.M. Pei will never be happy on Route 66.

Women are nothing but machines for producing children.

Forgive and forget.

"You mean, if you allow the master to be uncivil, to treat you any old way he likes, and to insult your dignity, then he may deem you fit to hear his view of things?" "Quite the contrary. You must defend your integrity, assuming you have integrit

Happiness is having a scratch for every itch.

If there were a school for, say, sheet metal workers, that after three years left its graduates as unprepared for their careers as does law school, it would be closed down in a minute, and no doubt by lawyers.

Long were the days of pain I have spent within its walls, and long were the nights of aloneness; and who can depart from his pain and his aloneness without regret?

Life is one long struggle in the dark.

To have died once is enough.

The secret of success is sincerity. Once you can fake that, you've got it made.

So so is good, very good, very excellent good: and yet it is not; it is but so so.

When the ax entered the forest, the trees said, "The handle is one of us!"

Absolutum obsoletum. (If it works, it's out of date.)

To do two things at once is to do neither.

In childhood a woman must be subject to her father; in youth to her husband; when her husband is dead, to her sons. A woman must never be free of subjugation.

If there were a school for, say, sheet metal workers, that after three years left its graduates as unprepared for their careers as does law school, it would be closed down in a minute, and no doubt by lawyers.

I am a deeply superficial person.

Alas, how love can trifle with itself!

If you know the answer to a question, don't ask.

The state of innocence contains the germs of all future sin.

I hate dying.

Let us not look back in anger or forward in fear, but around us in awareness.

The first rule of intelligent tinkering is to save all the parts.

With women, I've got a long bamboo pole with a leather loop on the end of it. I slip the loop around their necks so they can't get away or come too close. Like catching snakes.

Lo! Men have become the tool of their tools.

Whom the mad would destroy, first they make Gods.

I do desire we may be better strangers.

Fast ship? You mean you've never heard of the Millennium Falcon?

Someone did a study of the three most-often-heard phrases in New York City. One is "Hey, taxi." Two is, "What train do I take to get to Bloomingdale's?" And three is, "Don't worry. It's just a flesh wound."

When I was in school, I cheated on my metaphysics exam: I looked into the soul of the boy sitting next to me.

There are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.

Honesty is for the most part less profitable than dishonesty.

... A solemn, unsmiling, sanctimonious old iceberg who looked like he was waiting for a vacancy in the Trinity.

When in doubt, tell the truth.

I have just enough white in me to make my honesty questionable.

It's all right letting yourself go as long as you can let yourself back.

Sometimes, too long is too long.

We're living in a golden age. All you need is gold.

There is no doubt that my lawyer is honest. For example, when he filed his income tax return last year, he declared half of his salary as 'unearned income.'

This is the sort of English up with which I will not put.

The coast was clear.

The only thing that experience teaches us is that experience teaches us nothing.

I'll burn my books.

If little green men land in your back yard, hide any little green women you've got in the house.

A platitude is simply a truth repeated till people get tired of hearing it.

A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that balances are correct.

A memorandum is written not to inform the reader, but to protect the writer.

What an artist dies with me!

Whatever doesn't succeed in two months and a half in California will never succeed.

For there are moments when one can neither think nor feel. And if one can neither think nor feel, she thought, where is one?

An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.

The price one pays for pursuing any profession, or calling, is an intimate knowledge of its ugly side.

I always had a repulsive need to be something more than human.

"If once a man indulges himself in murder, very soon he comes to think little of robbing; and from robbing he next comes to drinking and Sabbath-breaking, and from that to incivility and procrastination."

Human resources are human first, and resources second.

Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society.

The big cities of America are becoming Third World countries.

Talkers are no good doers.

The true way goes over a rope which is not stretched at any great height but just above the ground. It seems more designed to make people stumble than to be walked upon.