In a way there's only a fine shade of difference between the healthy and the deranged.

The best way to keep a prisoner from escaping is to make sure he never knows he's in prison.

Pain and suffering are always inevitable for a large intelligence and a deep heart. The really great men must, I think, have great sadness on earth.

If you wish to glimpse inside a human soul and get to know a man ... just watch him laugh. If he laughs well, he's a good man.

Learning to love is hard and we pay dearly for it. It takes hard work and a long apprenticeship, for it is not just for a moment that we must learn to love, but forever.

People speak sometimes about the "bestial" cruelty of man, but that is terribly unjust and offensive to beasts, no animal could ever be so cruel as a man, so artfully, so artistically cruel.

It is better to be unhappy and know the worst, than to be happy in a fool's paradise.

Nothing is easier than to denounce the evildoer; nothing is more difficult than to understand him.

I think the devil doesn't exist, but man has created him, he has created him in his own image and likeness.

Don’t be overwise; fling yourself straight into life, without deliberation; don’t be afraid - the flood will bear you to the bank and set you safe on your feet again.

The most offensive is not their lying - one can always forgive lying - lying is a delightful thing, for it leads to truth - what is offensive is that they lie and worship their own lying.

Reading is going toward something that is about to be, and no one yet knows what it will be.

The thing that hunts me now thrives on terror. My terror. I fear he will come for me. I fear he will come for anyone who knows me.

May the Creator ignite the spark of light within our soul.

Those who cannot perceive are no better than those who cannot see...Those who cannot empathize are no better than those who cannot perceive...

I make music for the hips, not the head.

Power, people are obsessed with it. You can take a nice person and turn them into a slob, into an insane being, craving power, destroying anything that stands in their way.

I confess. If the law had been appiled to me properly for what I did in Vietnam, I'd have been convicted for high treason.

Originally, I wanted to be a composer. I always tell people, 'I think of myself as a composer.

I've almost been hit by a lot of things in New York City. I am pretty sure I have almost been hit by a bike messenger before.

Gregory Hines was the most talented man I've ever met or seen. Gregory Hines is one of those people that whenever he talked to you, you felt like you were the center of the universe.