"Adjust to changing times but sticking to unchanging principles" - committing me and all Americans to real ideals of justice and truth, no matter what difficulties faced us.

The measure of a society is found in how they treat their weakest and most helpless citizens.

What are the things that you can't see that are important? I would say justice, truth, humility, service, compassion, love...They're the guiding lights of a life.

America did not invent human rights. In a very real sense human rights invented America.

We cannot be both the world's leading champion of peace and the world's leading supplier of the weapons of war.

All I want is the same thing you want. To have a nation with a government that is as good and honest and decent and competent and compassionate and as filled with love as are the American people.

We become not a melting pot but a beautiful mosaic. Different people, different beliefs, different yearnings, different hopes, different dreams.

The test of a government is not how popular it is with the powerful and privileged few but how honestly and fairly it deals with the many who must depend on it.

America has no functioning democracy at this moment.

If you fear making anyone mad, then you ultimately probe for the lowest common denominator of human achievement.

It is difficult for the common good to prevail against the intense concentration of those who have a special interest, especially if the decisions are made behind locked doors.

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

It's all fun and games until someone loses an eye. Then it's fun and games you can't see anymore.

Courage is one of the best ingredients of success.

A fortress built long ago, Walls made timeless by historic glory.The small girl in the boat slows, To listen to its story.

The question is there in each silence. The question is there in the space between you. But you cannot bring it aloud.

Above all, our freedom endures because of the men and women in uniform who defend it.

In this league, experience means a lot.

Out in the sun, some painters are lined up. The first is copying nature, the second is copying the first, the third is copying the second... You see the sequence.

America is the noisiest country that ever existed. One is waked up in the morning, not by the singing of the nightingale, but by the steam whistle.

I try to shut my brain down as much as possible. And let the melodies flow, if possible.