Once is orthodox, twice is puritanical.

My esoteric doctrine, is that if you entertain any doubt, it is safest to take the unpopular side in the first instance. Transit from the unpopular, is easy... but from the popular to the unpopular is so steep and rugged that it is impossible to maintain it.

Nobody ever did anything very foolish except from some strong principle.

The whole duty of government is to prevent crime and to preserve contracts.

Things are coming to a pretty pass when religion is allowed to invade private life.

It is not much matter which we say, but mind, we must all say the same.

It wounds a man less to confess that he has failed in any pursuit through idleness, neglect, the love of pleasure, etc., etc., which are his own faults, than through incapacity and unfitness, which are the faults of his nature.

Once is orthodox, twice is puritanical.

That is no use at all. What I want is men who will support me when I am in the wrong.

A doctrinaire is a fool but an honest man.

I wish I was as cocksure of anything as Tom Macaulay is of everything.

I love the truth. Tell the truth and live the truth, because we've seen enough lies and look what it's doing.

My mother was a domestic goddess and Mother Earth figure. She was sweet and placid - just what the perfect wife was supposed to be and I was determined not to be.

You know what writers say about their long books: If I had another year, the book would be half as long.

Family... a group experience of love and support.

Seeking the good is not primarily about rules and commandments.

At a certain point, particularly in his third term, Mayor Bloomberg lost touch with the people he was serving.

Who learns most from a good book is the author.

I know my mother so well, so it's hard for me to remember that people have a certain image of her, but they don't really know her personality.

I never wear suits.

Pat Phoenix kept that amazing sassy look. I always wonder, was that because she was thrilled with that look, and thought it looked marvellous, or was it because she was too scared to change it? It's a double thing. Security and insecurity.

God is like a barber dont expect him to give you a haircut you must first get at his barbershop.

So the first thing that I thought about was, 'How is this car going to handle?' But then after I'd been driving with it and practicing with it and I accomplished that, then I just kind of sat back.

Growing up in the Philippines, I loved all kinds of movies. We had a very healthy film industry there when I was a child. It's now gotten very limited. They only make action movies and hard-core exploitation movies. Women get raped; men get shot.

Promise yourself to be so strong that nothing can disturb your peace of mind.

I have always been business minded, always been sorta an entrepreneurial guy; I played a character on 'Felicity' that was modeled after me, actually.

Of course I want to look good in clothes. And it never makes me feel good when somebody who has an insane figure tells me, 'I eat whatever I want.'

When we begin to build walls of prejudice, hatred, pride, and self-indulgence around ourselves, we are more surely imprisoned than any prisoner behind concrete walls and iron bars.

I'm pretty obsessed with Stevie Nicks from her style to her voice. I like watching her on YouTube and her old performances, the way she moves and everything.

As a child, I always wanted to be an actor. But as I grew older, the acting dream kind of faded away, and I took to studying a lot. A few years later, a relative of mine who really wanted me to try my hand at acting sent my photographs to a few production houses, and like they say, the rest is history.

It is not a dream that someday, nations will be able to settle their difficulties without war, just as individuals now settle their personal feuds without resorting to arguments of physical strength or sharp steel. For, then, humanity will have created international jurisdiction and a power to enforce its laws.

It's interesting to have the awkward moments play out, and the real human interactions. The more you cut that down, you lose the joke, which is that this is painful and hard.

I would make the movie industry more like the television industry. TV is more material driven. In TV, you can break new stars. TV can take more chances.

You have a soft spot in your heart for each movie, and you're doing certain things. You're learning as you're going, as a director, and each movie is its own entity.

That's the thing about memories, you can't forget them.