"When the shriveled skin of the ordinary is stuffed out with meaning, it satisfies the senses amazingly."

"Some people go to priests; others to poetry; I to my friends."

"Really I don't like human nature unless all candied over with art."

"Insisting that we must tax and take and demonize those who have already achieved the American Dream. That may turn out to be a good re-election strategy for President Obama, but is a demoralizing message for America."

"The argument for getting our own house in order is not an argument for turning our back on the world. We cannot and should not do that."

"I think America needs lots of tough people. Not just me. I think America needs to get tougher, all of us."

"I'm making this decision based on whether I believe in my heart that I'm ready to be president of the United States and that I want to be president of the United States right now."

"Someone has to stay on the line and say, no, we can do this by cutting spending and reducing the size of government. That's what I was committed to doing."

"And on this you have my pledge - unlike in the past, when you stood up and did what was right, this governor will not pull the rug out from underneath you - I will sign strong reform bills."

"You know, at some point there has to be parity. There has to be parity between what is happening in the real world, and what is happening in the public sector world."

"I can guarantee you this, that more pension and benefit reforms which I will consider arbitration reform to be one of them, are things that when they come to my desk, they will be signed."

"You just have to stand and grit your teeth and know your poll numbers are going to go down - and mine have - but you gotta grit through it because the alternative is unacceptable."

"Higher taxes is the road to ruin. We must and we will shrink our government, and that means making some tough choices, tightening our belts."

"Today is the day for the complaining to end and for statesmanship to begin. Today I am taking action to cut state spending and balance the budget this year."

"If we didn't live venturously, plucking the wild goat by the beard, and trembling over precipices, we should never be depressed, I've no doubt; but already should be faded, fatalistic and aged"

"The people elected us to end the talk and to act decisively."

"Now, aged 50, I'm just poised to shoot forth quite free straight and undeflected my bolts whatever they are."

"If we make the tough decisions now, we will be one year ahead of 80 percent of the states in the race to economic growth. If we fail to act, we will fall even further behind... by going first, we can become first."

"You cannot find peace by avoiding life."

"We pay a price when special interests win out over the collective national interest."

"At 46 one must be a miser; only have time for essentials."

"Today we must make a pact with each other to end this reckless conduct with the people's government."

"On the outskirts of every agony sits some observant fellow who points."

"I believe marriage should be between one man and one woman. That's my view, and that'll be the view of our state because I wouldn't sign a bill that - like the one that was in New York."

"If woman had no existence save in the fiction written by men, one would imagine her a person of the utmost importance; very various; heroic and mean; splendid and sordid; infinitely beautiful and hideous in the extreme; as great as a man, some think"

"Is there any wonder why we are in such big trouble? Any question why the people don't trust their government anymore, and demand a change?"

"For love... has two faces; one white, the other black; two bodies; one smooth, the other hairy. It has two hands, two feet, two tails, two, indeed, of every member and each one is the exact opposite of the other. Yet, so strictly are they joined together"

"I am pro-life, I believe in exceptions for rape, incest and the life of the mother. That's my position, take it or leave it."

"Some collaboration has to take place in the mind between the woman and the man before the art of creation can be accomplished. Some marriage of opposites has to be consummated. The whole of the mind must lie wide open if we are to get the sense that the"

"Everyone wants to demagogue everyone else. That may be good politics, but it's awful policy."

"Mitt Romney will tell us the hard truths we need to hear to end the debacle of putting the world's greatest care system in the hands of federal bureaucrats and putting those bureaucrats between an American citizen and her doctor."

"Henry James seems most entirely in his element, doing that is to say what everything favors his doing, when it is a question of recollection. The mellow light which swims over the past, the beauty which suffuses even the commonest little figures of that"

"I absolutely believe that, come November 2012, I'm going to be governor of New Jersey and not in any other office. But the fact of the matter is, if Gov. Romney, who's going to be our nominee, picked up the phone and called me to talk about this, I love my country enough and I love my party enough to listen."

"I will make no apologies, ever, for protecting the lives and the safety of the American people. We have to give more tools to our folks to be able to do that, not fewer, and then trust those people and oversee them to do it the right way. As president, that is exactly what I'll do."

"Let me tell you exactly what we would do on Social Security. Yes, we'd raise the retirement age two years and phase it in over 25 years; that means we'd raise it one month a year for 25 years when we're all living longer, and living better lives."

"I was born into a middle class family in New Jersey. My dad came home from serving in the Army after having lost his father, worked in the Breyers ice cream plant in Newark, New Jersey. Was the first person to graduate from college."

"Mom spent the time that she was supposed to be a kid actully raising children, her younger brother and younger sister. She was tough as nails and did not suffer fools at all. And the truth was she could not afford to. She spoke the truth, bluntly, directly, and without much varnish. I am her son."

"Now our founding fathers had the wisdom to know that social acceptance and popularity were fleeing, and that this country's principles needed to be rooted in strengths greater than the passions and the emotions of the times."

"We believe - we believe that, if we tell the people the truth, that they will act bigger than the pettiness we see in Washington, D.C. We believe it is possible to forge bipartisan compromise, and stand up for our conservative principles."

"The three top issues have to be restoring jobs and private sector job growth to our country, getting the entitlement mess under control, and restoring back to our country a sense of self-confidence that Americans can achieve whatever we want to achieve."

"Now, we believe that the majority of teachers in America know our system must be reformed, to put students first so that America can compete, that teachers don't teach to become rich or famous. They teach because they love children."

"Today, the biggest challenge we must meet is the one we present to ourselves. To not become a nation that places entitlement ahead of accomplishment. To not become a country that places comfortable lies ahead of difficult truths. To not become a people that thinks so little of ourselves that we demand no sacrifice from each other."

"One state retiree, 49 years old, paid, over the course of his entire career, a total of $124,000 towards his retirement pension and health benefits. What will we pay him? $3.3 million in pension payments over his life and nearly $500,000 for health care benefits - a total of $3.8m on a $120,000 investment."

"I said we are going to balance an $11 billion budget deficit in a $29 billion budget, so by percentage, the largest budget deficit in America, by percentage, larger than California, larger than New York, larger than Illinois. And we're going to balance that without raising taxes on the people of the state of New Jersey."

"Now, do I think there has to be shared sacrifice among other nations in the world who want a stable and secure world? Absolutely, there has to be. But I don't think that America can ever abdicate its leadership role in the world because of who we are and where we've come from. We are the symbol for the world for freedom and liberty."

"Given my last position, that I was the first U.S attorney post 9/11 in New Jersey, I understand acutely the pain and sorrow and upset of the family members who lost loved ones that day at the hands of radical Muslim extremists. And their sensitivities and concerns have to be taken into account."

"Our state is in crisis. Our people are hurting. Now is the time when we all must resist the traditional, selfish call to protect your own turf at the cost of our state. It is time to leave the corner, join the sacrifice, come to the center of the room and be part of the solution."

"A retired teacher paid $62,000 towards her pension and nothing, yes nothing, for full family medical, dental and vision coverage over her entire career. What will we pay her? $1.4 million in pension benefits and another $215,000 in health care benefit premiums over her lifetime."

"I am not going to make any commitments to the teachers union to do anything until they do something that's other than in their own self- interest. And everything they have done so far is in their self-interests, and that's it."

"The truth was you can't continue to spend the kind of money our spending on all these entitlement programs. I think we need more people in public life who are willing to say, no, we can't afford certain things. No, we can't do certain things."