The idea that you can merchandise candidates for high office like breakfast cereal - that you can gather votes like box tops - is, I think, the ultimate indignity to the democratic process.

My definition of a free society is a society where it is safe to be unpopular.

You can tell the size of a man by the size of the thing that makes him mad.

Those who corrupt the public mind are just as evil as those who steal from the public purse.

In America any boy may become President, and I suppose it's just one of the risks he takes.

The journey of a thousand leagues begins with a single step. So we must never neglect any work of peace within our reach, however small.

I believe in the forgiveness of sin and the redemption of ignorance.

All progress has resulted from people who took unpopular positions. All change is the result of a change in the contemporary state of mind.

A hypocrite is the kind of politician who would cut down a redwood tree, then mount the stump and make a speech for conservation.

As citizens of this democracy, you are the rulers and the ruled, the law-givers and the law-abiding, the beginning and the end.

Communism is the corruption of a dream of justice.

Take chances! Get messy! Make mistakes!

PRESCRIPTION A bitof virtuewill neverhurt you.

Grass is the forgiveness of nature - her constant benediction. Forests decay harvests perish flowers vanish but grass is immortal.

Thankfully, I'm lucky enough to be able to eat ice cream. I've got to have my cookies and cream! But I work out a lot, so I burn a lot of calories.

It is as easy to deceive one's self without perceiving it, as it is difficult to deceive others without their finding out.

Ewan McGregor and I had very similar first-time light sabre experiences. We both burned ourselves! These things are hot - they're full of batteries!

Part of the acting gig is when you're let loose some improvs and put stuff into your own words every once in a while. That doesn't get you a writing credit or more money. It just makes it more fun.

I grew up in a generation that had exponential technological advances.

Hope is the belief in the probability of the possible rather than the necessity of the probable.

Neither conscience nor sanity itself suggests that the United States is, should or could be the global gendarme.