“Laughter is the only free emotion - the only one that can't be compelled. We can be made to fear. We can even be made to believe we're in love because, if we're kept dependent and isolated for long enough, we bond in order to survive. But laughter explodes like an aha! It comes when the punch line changes everything that has gone before, when two opposites collide and make a third and when we suddenly see a new reality...laughter is an orgasm of the mind.” 

“For fear of the newspapers politicians are dull, and at last they are too dull even for the newspapers.” 

“The Declaration of Independence dogmatically bases all rights on the fact that God created all men equal; and it is right; for if they were not created equal, they were certainly evolved unequal. There is no basis for democracy except in a dogma about the divine origin of man.”

“Most modern freedom is at root fear. It is not so much that we are too bold to endure rules; it is rather that we are too timid to endure responsibilities.”

“Idolatry is committed, not merely by setting up false gods, but also by setting up false devils; by making men afraid of war or alcohol, or economic law, when they should be afraid of spiritual corruption and cowardice.”

All tremble at violence; all fear death. Putting oneself in the place of another, one should not kill nor cause another to kill.

“The whole secret of existence is to have no fear. Never fear what will become of you, depend on no one. Only the moment you reject all help are you freed.”

A mind unruffled by the vagaries of fortune, from sorrow freed, from defilements cleansed, from fear liberated — this is the greatest blessing.

Even death is not to be feared by one who has lived wisely.

A man is not called wise because he talks and talks again; but if he is peaceful, loving and fearless then he is in truth called wise

There is no fear for one whose mind is not filled with desires.

Run from what’s comfortable. Forget safety. Live where you fear to live. Destroy your reputation. Be notorious. I have tried prudent planning long enough. From now on I’ll be mad.

Move, but don’t move the way fear makes you move.

On what is fear: Non-acceptance of uncertainty. If we accept that uncertainty, it becomes an adventure!

The Prophets accept all agony and trust it. For the water has never feared the fire.

Take someone who doesn’t keep score, who’s not looking to be richer, or afraid of losing, who has not the slightest interest even in his own personality: he’s free.

Ignore those that make you fearful and sad, that degrade you back towards disease and death.

In the blackest of your moments, wait with no fear. 

It’s not the violence of the few that scares me, it’s the silence of the many.

Never, never be afraid to do what’s right, especially if the well-being of a person or animal is at stake. Society’s punishments are small compared to the wounds we inflict on our soul when we look the other way.

Courage faces fear and thereby masters it.

We must build dikes of courage to hold back the flood of fear.

Courage is the power of the mind to overcome fear.

Men often hate each other because they fear each other; they fear each other because they don’t know each other; they don’t know each other because they can not communicate; they can not communicate because they are separated.