Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything - all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.

I think it's brought the world a lot closer together, and will continue to do that. There are downsides to everything; there are unintended consequences to everything. The most corrosive piece of technology that I've ever seen is called television - but then, again, television, at its best, is magnificent.

There was never a genius without a tincture of madness.

Even a mistake may turn out to be the one thing necessary to a worthwhile achievement. 

Sir, my concern is not whether God is on our side; my greatest concern is to be on God's side, for God is always right.

When I do good I feel good, when I do bad I feel bad, and that's my religion.

Discontent is the first necessity of progress.

I consider myself as a free spokesman for the people.

When we tackle obstacles, we find hidden reserves of courage and resilience we did not know we had. And it is only when we are faced with failure do we realise that these resources were always there within us. We only need to find them and move on with our lives.

I was a disadvantaged child from a uneducated family, yet I had the advantage of being in the company of great teachers.

Our life of poverty is as necessary as the work itself. Only in heaven will we see how much we owe to the poor for helping us to love God better because of them.

Does anybody really think that they didn't get what they had because they didn't have the talent or the strength or the endurance or the commitment?