A commencement is a time of joy. It is also a time of melancholy. But then again, so is life.

This land, this water, this air, this planet - this is our legacy to our young.

I have pretty much made up my mind to do this.

No one is immune from the larger events of his or her time - the Depression, World War II, civil rights, Vietnam, the spring of 1989 in China. These events intrude upon our lives and radically affect our directions.

In this era of the global village, the tide of democracy is running. And it will not cease, not in China, not in South Africa, not in any corner of this earth, where the simple idea of democracy and freedom has taken root.

That sense of sacredness, that thinking in generations, must begin with reverence for this earth.

Our destiny is greatness and we must return to its fulfillment.

Two hundred years ago, our Founding Fathers gave us a democracy. It was based upon the simple, yet noble, idea that government derives its validity from the consent of the governed.

America is the sum of all our journeys as we search for our national community and our national culture.

My father's generation gave to my generation a land of wealth and purpose and world economic dominance.

Don't fear your mortality, because it is this very mortality that gives meaning and depth and poignancy to all the days that will be granted to you.

From a viable economy to the full funding of Headstart, from a clean environment to true equality for women, from a strong military to a commitment to racial brotherhood, from schools that are honored to streets free of excessive violence.

When George Bush used the Willie Horton ad, he knew what he was doing.

America is hope. It is compassion. It is excellence. It is valor.

Let's try winning and see what it feels like. If we don't like it, we can go back to our traditions.

It was a myth that's often perpetuated at commencement that holds that only hope and promise lie beyond the halls of academe. Don't worry, be happy. Everything is fine.

Seven and half years ago I began my own journey. For me and my family it was a time of adversity. But during that adversity I derived a deeper faith. And born out of that adversity was a commitment to devote myself to those people and to those issues that truly matter to me.

You are Americans. You love this country. Together we are entrusted with the principles that represent mankind's greatest political and social achievement.

I am an American. I love this country.

We are a continuum. Just as we reach back to our ancestors for our fundamental values, so we, as guardians of that legacy, must reach ahead to our children and their children. And we do so with a sense of sacredness in that reaching.

A commencement is a time of joy. It is also a time of melancholy. But then again, so is life.

You are part of that horrid expression, the best and the brightest. It can be a terrible burden if you let it be, but it is the great challenge of your time. And being a warrior in that challenge should be wondrous.

Journey with me to a true commitment to our environment. Journey with me to the serenity of leaving to our children a planet in equilibrium.

I want to deploy the leadership to meet the challenges that face us and to restore America's greatness.

Our only weapons in this war of your lifetime are the weapons of the mind.

That's a good question. Let me try to evade you.

Thinking in generations also means enabling our young to have a decent standard of living.

A commencement is a time of joy. It is also a time of melancholy. But then again so is life.

This land this water this air this planet this is our legacy to our young.

Breaststroke is an athletic event; butterfly is a political statement.

With an eye made quiet by the power of harmony, and the deep power of joy, we see into the life of things.

Sure, I get the blues. But what I try to do, is apply joy to the blues, you know? I don't know if it's a technique, or just being bent that way, being raised by the folks I was raised by.

Great joy, especially after a sudden change of circumstances, is apt to be silent, and dwells rather in the heart than on the tongue.

Color is my day-long obsession, joy and torment.

To the scientist there is the joy in pursuing truth which nearly counteracts the depressing revelations of truth.

A leaf fluttered in through the window this morning, as if supported by the rays of the sun, a bird settled on the fire escape, joy in the task of coffee, joy accompanied me as I walked.

In times of joy, all of us wished we possessed a tail we could wag.

I do not mind having written the song at all. I just wish that I had written it in a different key, as the high d is hard to play. I am glad that I wrote something that brought joy to millions of people.

The trouble with many men is that they have got just enough religion to make them miserable. If there is not joy in religion, you have got a leak in your religion.

As selfishness and complaint pervert the mind, so love with its joy clears and sharpens the vision.

This joy of discovery is real, and it is one of our rewards. So too is the approval of our work by our peers.

Let there be more joy and laughter in your living.

Love is the expression of one's values, the greatest reward you can earn for the moral qualities you have achieved in your character and person, the emotional price paid by one man for the joy he receives from the virtues of another.

And the goal really is to make the audience laugh, to bring them some joy.

Off with you! You're a happy fellow, for you'll give happiness and joy to many other people. There is nothing better or greater than that!

Who promised you that only for joy were you brought to this earth?

It's the sense of what family is at the dinner table. It was the joy of knowing mother was in the kitchen making our favorite dish. I wish more people would do this and recall the joy of life.

Irony is the gaiety of reflection and the joy of wisdom.

Health is the greatest possession. Contentment is the greatest treasure. Confidence is the greatest friend. Non-being is the greatest joy.