Chief among the forces affecting political folly is lust for power, named by Tacitus as "the most flagrant of all passions.

Government was rarely more than a choice between the disastrous and the unpalatable.

The process of gaining power employs means which degrade or brutalize the seeker, who awakes to find that power has been possessed at the cost of virtue or moral purpose lost.

House speaker Thomas read could see the trend, but he could not have changed himself.

Confronted by menace or what is perceived as menace, governments will usually attempt to smash it, rarely to examine it, understand it, and drefine it.

The utility of perseverance in absurdity is more than I could ever discern. Edmund Burke

He was always acting, always enveloping himself in artificiality, perhaps to conceal the volcano within.

How much does a man's effort depend upon the age in which his work is cast? Pope Clement VII

No single characteristic ever overtakes an entire society.

Prison does not silence ideas whose time has come.

Strong prejudices in an ill-formed mind are hazardous to government.

Quickness is the essence of the war.

Money is the longest route to happiness.

Ah, the souls of those that die Are but sunbeams lifted higher.

Every individual in the world has a unique contribution.

I am always with myself, and it is I who am my tormentor.

The more I invested in myself, the kinder I was to myself and the more I understood myself.

All I want to do is yoga and hike, and smoke weed. It's funny.

I learned how to sit on the couch in front of the fire and read a magazine, just for like eight hours a day, every day. It was... crazy.

You grieve Not that heaven does not exist but That it exists without us

A man may not always be what he appears to be, but what he appears to be is always a significant part of what he is.