When things are bad, we take comfort in the thought that they could always get worse. And when they are, we find hope in the thought that things are so bad they have to get better.

Elected leaders who forget how they got there won't the next time.

If you expect nothing, you're apt to be surprised. You'll get it.

The biggest mistake people make in life is not trying to make a living at doing what they most enjoy.

The purpose of education is to replace an empty mind with an open one.

The best vision is insight.

I think the foremost quality - there's no success without it - is really loving what you do. If you love it, you do it well, and there's no success if you don't do well what you're working at.

“Love is omni-inclusive, progressively exquisite, understanding and compassionately attuned to other than self.”

“For a society is always most cruel to those who disclose and reveal its secrets, when through dishonesty society itself has outraged Nature.”

"Forget trying to be sexy. That's just gruesome."

I know that we shall meet problems along the way, but I'd far rather see for myself what's going on in the world outside, than rely on newspapers, television, politicians and religious leaders to tell me what I should be thinking.

'Nice' means nothing. Is it someone who doesn't swear and shout? I swear and shout. 'Nice' sounds ineffectual.

I will die, but not retire.

Fame changes everything. When you're well-known, you're expected to be different. Some people assume you must have a yacht and four homes. Or that you're famous because you are 'A Decent Man'.

I've always been blessed, or cursed, some might say, with an insatiable curiosity, a desire to find something out about a people and a place. That's where it all begins.

I wanted to be an explorer, but gradually found the world had been explored and that there was nowhere left, really. Once they climbed Everest in 1953, when I was 10 years old, I thought, 'Well, that's pretty much it now.' But the idea of travelling and exploring and adventure was very strong.

Despite having seen a fair amount of the world, I still love travelling - I just have an insatiable curiosity and like looking out of a window.

'The Truth' is not meant to preach or point any fingers. It's meant to show that perhaps we should all avoid taking the moral high ground unless we have thought about things a bit more.

I do have high standards. I look at everything I have done and think, 'Why wasn't that better?' Part of my motivation is from crippling self-doubt - I have got to prove myself wrong.

I don't see why it should be remarkable that you can acquire a reputation for fairness and decency. Those are qualities shared by so many people. And the great majority of people I meet are decent people, just trying to navigate their way through the world without causing too much trouble.

I am not a great cook, I am not a great artist, but I love art, and I love food, so I am the perfect traveller.

You can't get a suit of armour and a rubber chicken just like that. You have to plan ahead.

No adolescent ever wants to be understood, which is why they complain about being misunderstood all the time.

The short answer to that is 'no.' The long answer is 'fuck no.