Could I pass a week in the insane ward at Blackwell's Island? I said I could and I would. And I did.

I have watched patients stand and gaze longingly toward the city they in all likelihood will never enter again. It means liberty and life; it seems so near, and yet heaven is not further from hell.

What a mysterious thing madness is. I have watched patients whose lips are forever sealed in a perpetual silence. They live, breathe, eat; the human form is there, but that something, which the body can live without, but which cannot exist without the body, was missing.

I took upon myself to enact the part of a poor, unfortunate crazy girl, and felt it my duty not to shirk any of the disagreeable results that should follow.

I always had a desire to know asylum life more thoroughly - a desire to be convinced that the most helpless of God's creatures, the insane, were cared for kindly and properly.

I shuddered to think how completely the insane were in the power of their keepers, and how one could weep and plead for release, and all of no avail, if the keepers were so minded.

It is only after one is in trouble that one realizes how little sympathy and kindness there are in the world.

They were being driven to a prison, through no fault of their own, in all probability for life. In comparison, how much easier it would be to walk to the gallows than to this tomb of living horrors!

I had never been near insane persons before in my life, and had not the faintest idea of what their actions were like.

All the asylum clothing is made by the patients, but sewing does not employ one's mind. After several months' confinement the thoughts of the busy world grow faint, and all the poor prisoners can do is to sit and ponder over their hopeless fate.

People in the world can never imagine the length of days to those in asylums. They seemed never ending, and we welcomed any event that might give us something to think about as well as talk of.

Could I pass a week in the insane ward at Blackwell's Island? I said I could and I would. And I did.

On the wagon sped, and I, as well as my comrades, gave a despairing farewell glance at freedom as we came in sight of the long stone buildings.

I hardly expected the grand jury to sustain me, after they saw everything different from what it had been while I was there. Yet they did, and their report to the court advises all the changes made that I had proposed.

I had, toward the last, been shut off from all visitors, and so when the lawyer, Peter A. Hendricks, came and told me that friends of mine were willing to take charge of me if I would rather be with them than in the asylum, I was only too glad to give my consent.

How can a doctor judge a woman's sanity by merely bidding her good morning and refusing to hear her pleas for release? Even the sick ones know it is useless to say anything, for the answer will be that it is their imagination.

In our short walks we passed the kitchen where food was prepared for the nurses and doctors. There we got glimpses of melons and grapes and all kinds of fruits, beautiful white bread and nice meats, and the hungry feeling would be increased tenfold.

I always made a point of telling the doctors I was sane, and asking to be released, but the more I endeavored to assure them of my sanity, the more they doubted it.

I had looked forward so eagerly to leaving the horrible place, yet when my release came and I knew that God's sunlight was to be free for me again, there was a certain pain in leaving.

Even that was all consumed after two days, and the patients had to try to choke down fresh fish, just boiled in water, without salt, pepper or butter; mutton, beef, and potatoes without the faintest seasoning.

I was always a singer and a dancer, and I always wanted to be an actress. For me, it's all just one thing.

You never see bad days in a photo album but it is these days that get us from one happy snapshot to the next.

In the world of money and investing, you must learn to control your emotions.

I think serious situations actually make for the best kind of belly laughs. But they're also the hardest to convert into comedy at the outset.

When he took time to help the man up the mountain, lo, he scaled it himself.

I see myself as an average to above-average catcher in the big leagues.

Civility is not about dousing strongly held views. It's about making sure that people are willing to respect other perspectives.

People are struggling. They're trying to make ends meet, and they're looking for Washington to deliver for them. And they don't feel that that's been happening as quickly as it should. We share that frustration. There's no one more frustrated than President Obama.

It's strange to look back over a full season. Our characters have accrued all these memories, but so have we, the actors. And sometimes the character memories and the actor memories bleed into each other.

Nobody inspired me more than Julie Andrews, who is a classically trained soprano herself.

I'm from the gulf coast of Louisiana.

I think I'm a vocal genius, not a musical genius. I like background vocals. I consider myself a voice, not a singer. A voice is a sound, and singing is what you do with that sound.

I don't think theater is dying, and musicals are a great American art form. We've got apple pie, jazz and musical theater.

Judge tenderly, if you must. There is usually a side you have not heard, a story you know nothing about, and a battle waged that you are not having to fight.

Animals do not admire each other. A horse does not admire its companion.

Ridley Scott's 'Prometheus' is a magnificent science-fiction film, all the more intriguing because it raises questions about the origin of human life and doesn't have the answers.

I know stuff about 'Lord of the Rings' and 'Star Wars,' but 'Star Trek,' I don't know.

Hills are speedwork in disguise.

There isn't much political coloration in my economic writing; it's not surprising that few people know my political views. They really aren't very important.

I love sports. Anytime I can combine sports with a film I'm a happy guy. It's such a natural fit, because sports always seems to be a metaphor for life. Always, always, always.

As an actor, you just want to continue to work on things that you like. You can be in this business a long time and consistently working and just be totally artistically unfulfilled.

Openness has been vital to Asia's fast growth in the past and it will continue to be crucial for the area's further development.

You can build a filter app get people really excited, but the way to keep them is to provide long-term value. Long-term value is, in fact, being its own network.

The Daily Mail can't say 'asylum-seeker' without saying 'foreign criminal' in the same sentence. I'm sure it's practically editorial policy.