Nothing can come out of nothing, any more than a thing can go back to nothing.

The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts.

When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive - to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.

Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.

It never ceases to amaze me: we all love ourselves more than other people, but care more about their opinions than our own.

You have power over your mind - not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.

The opinion of 10,000 men is of no value if none of them know anything about the subject.

If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.

Whenever you are about to find fault with someone, ask yourself the following question: What fault of mine most nearly resembles the one I am about to criticize?

The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.

Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking.

The dark-haired girl behind Winston had begun crying out: 'Swine! Swine! Swine!', and suddenly she picked up a heavy Newspeak dictionary and flung it at the screen.

Madness in great ones must not unwatched go.

Many patients with cancer are depressed, yet depression is not the cause of cancer.

One time a French reporter asked me how I could do a cross so easily. I said, "You just lower your body down until your arms are straight out to the sides, then you stop."

So long as the serpent continues to crawl on the ground, the primary influence of woman will be indirect.

According to Beckett's or Kafka's law, there is immobility beyond movement: beyond standing up, there is sitting down, and beyond sitting down, lying down, beyond which one finally dissipates.

Music, for me, is completely self-indulgent. I write it, I play the instruments, I arrange it, I produce it. It's all about me - as it should be.

This was good training for research, because large parts of experimental work are sometimes boring or involve the use of skills in which one is not particularly gifted.

Evil thenceforth became my good.

I am regarded as a usurper, as an imposter and dilettante, because I do technically come from the wrong side of the tracks in musical terms.