[On turning down an invitation to appear for four minutes on the Ed Sullivan Show:] Honey, it takes Moms four minutes just to get on the stage.

Love is like playing checkers. You have to know which man to move.

Advice to children crossing the street: damn the lights. Watch the cars. The lights ain't never killed nobody.

Ain't nothin' an ol' man can do but bring me a message from a young one.

Black women, white women- all of them. I'm colorblind. I don't know the difference. I only know you're a human being and you're my children.

Anytime you see me with my arms around an old man, I'm holding him for the police.

My husband was so ugly, he used to stand outside the doctor’s office and make people sick.

It's no disgrace to be old. But damn if it isn't inconvenient.

The teenagers aren't all bad. I love 'em if nobody else does. There ain't nothing wrong with young people. Jus' quit lyin' to 'em.

A woman is a woman until the day she dies, but a man's man only as long as he can

I don't want nothing old but some old money. Buy me some young ideas. That's what I'm gonna do with it.

When God asks a question, it is always rhetorical.

An act made in fear is not the same thing as an action taken for necessity.

Positive life, positive action.

Each moment of a happy love's hour is worth an age of dull and common life.

A country that denies it, citizens, the opportunity to "civil liberties", better health care, schools, roads, electricity and water. Is a country on a brink of no return.

Gentleman: one who never hurts anyone's feelings unintentionally.

I do tend to move on anyway. This is a part of my life, but it doesn't rule my life.

Every nail driven should be as another rivet in the machine of the universe, you carrying on the work.

The story about me, apocryphal or not, is that I could sing before I spoke. My parents went into bedroom one day and there I was standing in the crib singing God Bless America.

If you try to turn me against Lissa one more time the stories are going to be about you bleeding because I'll have ripped your throat out!