Men’s best successes come after their disappointments.

Try not to become a man of success but a man of value.

If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put foundations under them.

Inspiration and genius – one and the same.

To find what you seek in the road of life, the best proverb of all is that which says: “Leave no stone unturned."

If you would create something, you must be something.

Every artist was first an amateur.

The more difficulties one has to encounter, within and without, the more significant and the higher in inspiration his life will be.

Life has no smooth road for any of us; and in the bracing atmosphere of a high aim the very roughness stimulates the climber to steadier steps, till the legend, over steep ways to the stars, fulfills itself.

Do we not all agree to call rapid thought and noble impulse by the name of inspiration?

No great man ever complains of want of opportunities.

Men do less than they ought, unless they do all they can.

Happy are those who dream dreams and are ready to pay the price to make them come true.

The power of imagination makes us infinite.

First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do.

It was a high counsel that I once heard given to a young person, “Always do what you are afraid to do.”

Take calculated risks. That is quite different from being rash.

If you do not hope, you will not find what is beyond your hopes.

We are all inventors, each sailing out on a voyage of discovery, guided each by a private chart, of which there is no duplicate. The world is all gates, all opportunities.

Seek the lofty by reading, hearing and seeing great work at some moment every day.

The only way of finding the limits of the possible is by going beyond them into the impossible.

Without inspiration the best powers of the mind remain dormant. There is a fuel in us which needs to be ignited with sparks.

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act but a habit.

Work spares us from three evils: boredom, vice, and need.

If the wind will not serve, take to the oars. – Destitutus ventis, remos adhibe

Experience is the child of thought, and thought is the child of action.

You cannot plough a field by turning it over in your mind.

The best way out is always through.

Do not wait to strike till the iron is hot; but make it hot by striking.

Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must first be overcome.

Fortune favors the brave.

When the best things are not possible, the best may be made of those that are.

He who hesitates is lost.

Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds.

Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do.

We are still masters of our fate. We are still captains of our souls.

Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm.

For hope is but the dream of those that wake.

Constant dripping hollows out a stone.

Nothing contributes so much to tranquilize the mind as a steady purpose–a point on which the soul may fix its intellectual eye.

Anytime something starts to feel like a popularity contest or not about the music, I'd rather just not be involved. I'm not a big high-fiver. That really gets to people around me when we have a No. 1 or something big happen. I'm not a big, 'Let's go have a party about it!'

I am learning to take control of my habits.

Creative people are very insecure people because they don't know whether people like them or are in awe of them. That insecurity always comes out. It makes them a better actor, I feel.

I sometimes think that what I do as a writer is make a kind of colouring book, where all the lines are there, and then you put in the colour.

In Republics, the great danger is, that the majority may not sufficiently respect the rights of the minority

Home will always be Northern Ireland but my schedule means for the next few years I won't be there as much. I can't do the same things that I did a year ago. That is I'm something conscious of, but I'm not sad about it. It's fine.

Commercial movies have no feeling, no sensitivity. Most people tell me people won't understand films with feeling. But everyone can feel.

Obama invented himself against all odds and repeated parental abandonment, and he worked hard to regiment his emotions. But now that can come across as imperviousness and inflexibility. He wants to run the agenda; he doesn't want the agenda to run him. Once you become president, though, there's no way to predict what your crises will be.

Do whatever you will, but first be such as are able to will.