Do not be held a cheat, even though it is impossible to live today without being one. Let your greatest cunning lie in covering up what looks like cunning.
Lasting change is a series of compromises. And compromise is all right, as long your values don't change.
If there is anything good about nobility it is that it enforces the necessity of avoiding degeneracy.
We must not allow ourselves to become like the system we oppose.
The battered idealist. It's just my favorite character ... To me, a hero is somebody who is able to accept the environment of the world, deal with the stuff that's thrown in their path ... and somehow keep their heart.
What would you be like if you had white hair and had not given up your principles? It might be wise as you deal with coalition efforts to think about the possibilities of going for fifty years.
One must respect black. Nothing prostitutes it.
When you sit on something trying to preserve it, you die and become sterile.
I tried to give my best and truthful answer to any committee I have appeared before and it's really - people are suggesting through innuendo that I have been not honest about matters and I've tried to be honest.
It's really difficult to navigate attention and stardom and celebrity status and still try to maintain yourself and hold onto your intelligence and integrity. It's really challenging.
I came back from the Olympic Games, and straightaway, I'm this role model. So that means I can't mess around with my mates like I used to because, if I do, people are going to use it to knock me down.
In making the jump from a local program to the showcase of a coast-to-coast broadcast, Ted Yates and I were determined to maintain the candid, sometimes combative style we'd introduced on 'Night Beat.' But that proved easier said than done.
How can we be scrupulous In a life which, from birth onwards, is so determined To wring us dry of any serenity at all?
I thought deeply about this. I ended up concluding that the worst thing that could possibly happen as we get big and as we get a little more influence in the world is if we change our core values and start letting it slide, I can't do that. I'd rather quit.
I was born to fight devils and factions. It is my business to remove obstacles, to cut down thorns, to fill up quagmires and to open and make straight paths. If I must have some failing let me rather speak the truth with too great sincerity than once to act the hypocrite and conceal the truth.
If you're allowed to make your mistakes, I think you should. But people don't really like hearing you admit them. Although I'd never wanted to dump on the musicians that were involved in that... Because it was not their fault.
I'm not changing because I'm part of a hit. People around me have changed in their attitude toward me, but I haven't changed. And I won't.
Honor is like an island, rugged and without shores; we can never re-enter it once we are on the outside. [Fr., L'honneur est comme une ile escarpee et sans bords; On n'y peut plus rentrer des qu'on en est dehors.]
It is difficult to retain your standards with the pressure of trying to make money, which always has its rules...It's hard to walk the tightrope of doing what you think is your best and making money at it.
It's important just to be yourself. And probably stay out of trouble.
I sort of pride myself in my dissatisfaction with my work. I've always been concerned with buying the hype, and having that make your performances suffer.
Precious few are those who can live in the lap of luxury ... who can keep their moral, spiritual and financial equilibrium ... while balancing on the elevated tightrope of success. ... there is about one in a hundred who can dance to the tune of success without paying the piper named Compromise.
Build a good name. Keep your name clean. Don't make compromises. Don't worry about making a bunch of money or being successful. Be concerned with doing good work and make the right choices and protect your work. And if you can build a good name, eventually, that name will be its own currency.
You do what you can with what you have. You have to work the edges whatever they are. The main thing is keeping your integrity.
As crises came up later on - "Oh, we have to compromise, and the record company wants to do this," I'd be like, "No, I don't have to."
