The man of pleasure by a vain attempt to be more happy than any man can be is often more miserable than most men.

True friendship is like sound health; the value of it is seldom known until it is lost.

Nothing more completely baffles one who is full of trick and duplicity himself, than straight forward and simple integrity in another.

The soundest argument will produce no more conviction in an empty head than the most superficial declamation; as a feather and a guinea fall with equal velocity in a vacuum.

The art of declamation has been sinking in value from the moment that speakers were foolish enough to publish, and hearers wise enough to read.

None are so fond of secrets as those who do not mean to keep them; such persons covet secrets as a spendthrift covets money, for the purpose of circulation.

Much may be done in those little shreds and patches of time which every day produces, and which most men throw away.

Let those who would affect singularity with success first determine to be very virtuous, and they will be sure to be very singular.

Atheism is a system which can communicate neither warmth nor illumination, except from those fagots which your mistaken zeal has lighted up for its destruction.

Deliberate with caution, but act with decision and yield with graciousness, or oppose with firmness.

The study of mathematics, like the Nile, begins in minuteness but ends in magnificence.

Achievements take leaders' name everywhere. Character keeps those names wherever they reach. A leader with no trust soon fades no matter how far he goes.

Maybe so, but I'm not just looking up at the sky and waiting for the fruit to drop. In my own way, I'm working hard. I'm working ten times harder than you are.

We all have within us a deep wisdom, but sometimes we don't know we have it.

If there is one thing I hope my books do always and forever, its that they honor working people.

We have to adjust ourselves, and every radical adjustment is a crisis in self-esteem: we undergo a test, we have to prove ourselves.

Inspiration springs more readily from knowledge than from ignorance.

I finally got a chance to talk to my daughter from my previous marriage. I just got married May 3 to my beautiful wife, but we don't see each other much.

I would love to be a well-educated black, because I believe they do have an actual advantage.

No amount of self-improvement can make up for any lack of self-acceptance.

I own now, I think about 38 pairs of cowboy boots, or 37, something like that now.