"I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will."
— Charlotte Brontë

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter, and those who matter don't mind."
— Dr. Seuss

"A day without sunshine is like, you know, night."
— Steve Martin

"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."
— Oscar Wilde (Lady Windermere's Fan)

"Equations are the devil's sentences."
— Stephen Colbert

"The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid."
— Jane Austen (Northanger Abbey)

"Nobody can make you feel inferior without your consent."
— Eleanor Roosevelt

"It is in vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquillity: they must have action; and they will make it if they cannot find it. Millions are condemned to a stiller doom than mine, and millions are in silent revolt against their lot. Nobody knows how many rebellions besides political rebellions ferment in the masses of life which people earth. Women are supposed to be very calm generally: but women feel just as men feel; they need exercise for their faculties, and a field for their efforts, as much as their brothers do; they suffer from too rigid a restraint, to absolute a stagnation, precisely as men would suffer; and it is narrow-minded in their more privileged fellow-creatures to say that they ought to confine themselves to making puddings and knitting stockings, to playing on the piano and embroidering bags. It is thoughtless to condemn them, or laugh at them, if they seek to do more or learn more than custom has pronounced necessary for their sex."
— Charlotte Brontë (Jane Eyre)

"If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything."
— Mark Twain

"Remember, if the time should come when you have to make a choice between what is right and what is easy, remember what happened to a boy who was good, and kind, and brave, because he strayed across the path of Lord Voldemort. Remember Cedric Diggory."
— J.K. Rowling (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire)

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and it may be necessary from time to time to give a stupid or misinformed beholder a black eye."
— Miss Piggy

"Do you think I am an automaton? — a machine without feelings? and can bear to have my morsel of bread snatched from my lips, and my drop of living water dashed from my cup? Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and little, I am soulless and heartless? You think wrong! — I have as much soul as you — and full as much heart! And if God had gifted me with some beauty and much wealth, I should have made it as hard for you to leave me, as it is now for me to leave you. I am not talking to you now through the medium of custom, conventionalities, nor even of mortal flesh: it is my spirit that addresses your spirit; just as if both had passed through the grave, and we stood at God's feet, equal — as we are! (Jane to Mr. Rochester-Ch. 23)"
— Charlotte Brontë (Jane Eyre)

"Some people have a way with words....some people....not have way."
— Steve Martin (Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life)

"Boy, those French! They have a different word for everything."
— Steve Martin

"I like a woman with a head on her shoulders. I hate necks."
— Steve Martin

"We've had some fun tonight...considering we're all gonna die someday."
— Steve Martin

"I believe entertainment can aspire to be art, and can become art, but if you set out to make art you're an idiot."
— Steve Martin

"No one who can read, ever looks at a book, even unopened on a shelf, like one who cannot."
— Charles Dickens

"An archaeologist is the best husband a woman can have. The older she gets, the more interested he is in her."
— Agatha Christie

"One is left with the horrible feeling now that war settles nothing; that to win a war is as disastrous as to lose one."
— Agatha Christie

""Poirot" I said. "I have been thinking."
"An admirable exercise my friend. Continue it.""
— Agatha Christie (Peril at End House)

"Don't walk behind me; I may not lead. Don't walk in front of me; I may not follow. Just walk beside me and be my friend."
— Albert Camus

"It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt."
— Abraham Lincoln

"Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read."
— Groucho Marx (The Essential Groucho)

"I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying."
— Oscar Wilde

"The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference."
— Elie Wiesel

"Whenever I feel the need to exercise, I lie down until it goes away."
— Robert Maynard Hutchins

"The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who can't read them."
— Mark Twain

"A fool thinks himself to be wise, but a wise man knows himself to be a fool."
— William Shakespeare (As You Like It)

"If you don't stand for something you will fall for anything."
— Malcolm X

"I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by."
— Douglas Adams

"In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on."
— Robert Frost

"There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle."
— Albert Einstein

"To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and to endure the betrayal of false friends. To appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to leave the world a bit better whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition; to know that even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded."
— Bessie Anderson Stanley

"In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
— Douglas Adams (The Restaurant at the End of the Universe)

"There's not a liberal America and a conservative America - there's the United States of America."
— Barack Obama

"We don't ask you to believe in our ability to bring change, rather, we ask you to believe in yours."
— Barack Obama

"If you make peaceful revolution impossible you make violent revolution inevitable"
— Barack Obama

"If there's a child on the south side of Chicago who can't read, that matters to me, even if it's not my child. If there's a senior citizen somewhere who can't pay for their prescription, who has to choose between medicine and the rent, that makes my life poorer - even if it's not my grandparent. If there's an Arab-American or Mexican-American family being rounded up by John Ashcroft without benefit of an attorney or due process, I know that that threatens my civil liberties. And I don't have to be a woman to be concerned that the Supreme Court is trying to take away a woman's right, because I know that my rights are next. It is that fundamental belief - I am my brother’s keeper, I am my sister’s keeper - that makes this country work."
— Barack Obama

"Focusing your life solely on making a buck shows a poverty of ambition. It asks too little of yourself. And it will leave you unfulfilled."
— Barack Obama

"All logical arguments can be defeated by the simple refusal to reason logically"
— Steven Weinberg (Dreams of a Final Theory)

"If our Founding Fathers wanted us to care about the rest of the world, they wouldn't have declared their independence from it."
— Stephen Colbert

"If I had a dime for everytime that I was wrong, I'd be broke."
— Stephen Colbert

"Agnostics are just atheists without balls."
— Stephen Colbert (I Am America: And So Can You!)

"It is a well know fact that reality has liberal bias"
— Stephen Colbert

"I’m the frosting on America’s cake, and tonight I’m willing to let you lick the bowl."
— Stephen Colbert

"Atheism, a religion dedicated to its own sense of smug superiority."
— Stephen Colbert

"Baby carrots are making me gay."
— Stephen Colbert (I Am America: And So Can You!)

"The only thing that gets me high is the musky scent of my enemy's fear"
— Stephen Colbert

"There's an old saying about those who forget history. I don't remember it, but it's good."
— Stephen Colbert