I hope that memory is valued - that we do not lose memory.

I thought, if ever there were a time to write a book about hope, it's now.

With optimism, you look upon the sunny side of things. People say, 'Studs, you're an optimist.' I never said I was an optimist. I have hope because what's the alternative to hope? Despair? If you have despair, you might as well put your head in the oven.

That's why I wrote this book: to show how these people can imbue us with hope. I read somewhere that when a person takes part in community action, his health improves. Something happens to him or to her biologically. It's like a tonic.

You happen to be talking to an agnostic. You know what an agnostic is? A cowardly atheist.

If solace is any sort of succor to someone, that is sufficient. I believe in the faith of people, whatever faith they may have.

I'm not up on the Internet, but I hear that is a democratic possibility. People can connect with each other. I think people are ready for something, but there is no leadership to offer it to them. People are ready to say, 'Yes, we are part of a world.'

Religion obviously played a role in this book and the previous book, too.

We are the most powerful nation in the world, but we're not the only nation in the world. We are not the only people in the world. We are an important people, the wealthiest, the most powerful and, to a great extent, generous. But we are part of the world.

I think it's realistic to have hope. One can be a perverse idealist and say the easiest thing: 'I despair. The world's no good.' That's a perverse idealist. It's practical to hope, because the hope is for us to survive as a human species. That's very realistic.

I want, of course, peace, grace, and beauty. How do you do that? You work for it.

I hope for peace and sanity - it's the same thing.

Someone who does an act. In a democratic society, you're supposed to be an activist; that is, you participate. It could be a letter written to an editor.

I hope that memory is valued - that we do not lose memory.

I want to praise activists through the years. I praise those of the past as well, to have them honored.

I've always felt, in all my books, that there's a deep decency in the American people and a native intelligence - providing they have the facts, providing they have the information.

I want a language that speaks the truth.

We use the word 'hope' perhaps more often than any other word in the vocabulary: 'I hope it's a nice day.' 'Hopefully, you're doing well.' 'So how are things going along? Pretty good. Going to be good tomorrow? Hope so.'

That's what we're missing. We're missing argument. We're missing debate. We're missing colloquy. We're missing all sorts of things. Instead, we're accepting.

When you become part of something, in some way you count. It could be a march; it could be a rally, even a brief one. You're part of something, and you suddenly realize you count. To count is very important.

I want people to talk to one another no matter what their difference of opinion might be.

All the other books ask, 'What's it like?' What was World War II like for the young kid at Normandy, or what is work like for a woman having a job for the first time in her life? What's it like to be black or white?

So people are ready. I feel hopeful in that sense.

I always love to quote Albert Einstein because nobody dares contradict him.

People are ready to say, 'Yes, we are ready for single-payer health insurance.' We are the only industrialized country in the world that does not have national health insurance. We are the richest in wealth and the poorest in health of all the industrial nations.

Nonetheless, do I have respect for people who believe in the hereafter? Of course I do. I might add, perhaps even a touch of envy too, because of the solace.

Why are we born? We're born eventually to die, of course. But what happens between the time we're born and we die? We're born to live. One is a realist if one hopes.

But once you become active in something, something happens to you. You get excited and suddenly you realize you count.

Chicago is not the most corrupt American city. It's the most theatrically corrupt.

Chicago is not the most corrupt American city. Its the most theatrically corrupt.

Work is a search for daily meaning as well as for daily bread.

Ordinary people are capable of doing extraordinary things, and that's what it's all about. They must count.

You are not here merely to make a living. You are here in order to enable the world to live more amply, with greater vision, with a finer spirit of hope and achievement. You are here to enrich the world, and you impoverish yourself if you forget the errand.

Hope is the struggle of the soul, breaking loose from what is perishable, and attesting her eternity.

All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom, justice, honor, duty, mercy, hope.

The tender heart, the broken and contrite spirit, are to me far above all the joys that I could ever hope for in this vale of tears.

The most important training, though, is to experience life as a writer, questioning everything, inventing multiple explanations for everything. If you do that, all the other things will come; if you don't, there's no hope for you.

I hope that people will finally come to realize that there is only one 'race' - the human race - and that we are all members of it.

The only hope is that our civilization will collapse at a certain point, as always happens in history. Then, out of barbarity, a renaissance.

Infuse your life with action. Don't wait for it to happen. Make it happen. Make your own future. Make your own hope. Make your own love. And whatever your beliefs, honor your creator, not by passively waiting for grace to come down from upon high, but by doing what you can to make grace happen... yourself, right now, right down here on Earth.

Hope is generally a wrong guide, though it is very good company by the way.

I don't sit in the corner waiting for death: death has to pursue me. I'm going strong. I hope to reach 100 and ask for an extension, just like my grandmother did.

When I talk to people in need, they tell me they want to hope; they are eager for opportunity; they are ready for better days. And I can tell you that every time their hopes are disappointed, all nations lose.

I'd hope to reach any kid who feels apart from the group - those who seem to be outsiders, who feel different. Kids who want to reach their parents often don't know how to do so.

If we can just take a few companies, and use those as models, as examples, to show the rest of corporate America how they can become more competitive, that's what I'd like to do and that's what I hope to do.

It's part of the calling to at least do a few songs in the show that give people some hope. There's so much hurt in this world and... music is such a great healing balm and a great way to forget your troubles.

Just as a mother finds pleasure in taking her little child on her lap, there to feed and caress him, in like manner our loving God shows His fondness for His beloved souls who have given themselves entirely to Him and have placed all their hope in His goodness.

Yesterday I was a dog. Today I'm a dog. Tomorrow I'll probably still be a dog. Sigh! There's so little hope for advancement.

Testimony is an integral part of the Black religious tradition. It is the occasion where the believer stands before the community of faith in order to give account of the hope that is in him or her.