In the beginning there was nothing and God said ‘Let there be light’, and there was still nothing but everybody could see it.
Drawing on my fine command of the English language, I said nothing.
I listened to my kids talk about me as a parent, and I learned about things they wished I’d done and said. And I wished that I had done more of those things.
Love, in the eyes of the world, is either a carnal appetite or a vague fancy, which possession extinguishes or absence destroys. That is why it is commonly said, with a strange abuse of words, that passion does not endure.
It has been said that 80% of what people learn is visual.
I figured that if I said it enough, I would convince the world that I really was the greatest.
Tell the audience what you’re going to say, say it; then tell them what you’ve said.
I’ve always said I’m going to get married only once.
In ‘There’s Something About Mary’ and ‘Dumb & Dumber,’ I ended up improvising quite a bit of my scenes, and later I didn’t even remember what I’d said because I just winged it. When I went and saw the movie, I was as stunned as everyone else was.
What can be shown, cannot be said.
There’s something to be said for giving and helping to change people’s lives.
In the beginning there was nothing. God said, ‘Let there be light!’ And there was light. There was still nothing, but you could see it a whole lot better.
The role of the intellectual, so it is said, is to speak truth to power. Noam Chomsky has dismissed this pious tag on two grounds. For one thing, power knows the truth already; it is just busy trying to conceal it. For another, it is not those in power who need the truth, but those they oppress.
I have written and said countless times it is not what happens to you in life that makes a difference! It is how we react to what happens to us in life that creates our history and – more importantly – our future!
I have said that propaganda, misinformation, and disinformation have always been part of political warfare. Social media and other new platforms have given it a new life and reach through which the fake news phenomenon can reach everywhere.
I was 24 when I was embroiled in a high-profile lawsuit. This was 2014, long before, en masse and on social media, we said #MeToo and #TimesUp. At the time, I felt completely alone. Visceral, hateful online harassment from strangers left me paranoid and anxious for years afterward.
I have been celibate for about six or seven months, I think. I would rather just make out and kiss someone instead of sex. I’m single. I said I would be single for a year and I am.
I remember I read this harsh review about my show, and one of my friends told me that this was the exact same stuff people said about Madonna. And it’s like, she didn’t care. Madonna just came out and was herself. I respect that a lot.
Someone once said that Sci Fi was the modern Western. What’s my favorite? Well, anything that needs a misfit. I don’t have a real favorite. My dream is to play something different.
We must not be afraid to define our enemy. It is Islamic extremist terrorism. I did not say all of Islam. I said Islamic extremist terrorism. Failing to identify them properly maligns decent Muslims around the world. It also sets up a fear of being politically incorrect that can have serious consequences. And it has.
You know, there’s nobody where I’ve said, ‘Man, I really want that guy’s career.’ I mean, each of us has to make our own go of it.
In the Bible it says they asked Jesus how many times you should forgive, and he said 70 times 7. Well, I want you all to know that I’m keeping a chart.
‘But I don’t want to go among mad people,’ said Alice. ‘Oh, you can’t help that,’ said the cat. ‘We’re all mad here.’
My dad was a very quiet person, and unbelievably tough. But my grandmother gave me my first look at negative thinking to bring about positive results. When I was just a little guy, anytime I came to my grandmother and said I wish for this or that, Grandma would say, ‘If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.’
It has been said that a pretty face is a passport. But it’s not, it’s a visa, and it runs out fast.
As the poet said, ‘Only God can make a tree,’ probably because it’s so hard to figure out how to get the bark on.
I have heard something said about allegiance to the South. I know no South, no North, no East, no West, to which I owe any allegiance.
When I turned 50, something clicked in my head and I said, ‘I’m not going to live to 100. I’m half-cooked already.’ I set the family down and I said, ‘Listen everybody, we’re now entering the decade of Daddy. We’re going to start doing things that I want to do.’
There are matters in the Bible, said to be done by the express commandment of God, that are shocking to humanity and to every idea we have of moral justice.
You can be a follower of Muhammad or Jesus or Buddha or whomever. Always, they said that the most essential factor is to love your neighbor. And to love you.
A lot of black guys always ask me, ‘Did Larry Bird really play that good?’ I said, ‘Larry Bird is so good it’s frightening.’
Again, it may be said, that to love justice and equality the people need no great effort of virtue; it is sufficient that they love themselves.
The Matrix is top secret. There isn’t much that can be said right now.
On privacy issues, it’s just like hundreds of years ago when people said, ‘I would rather put my money under my pillow than in a bank.’ But today, banks know how to protect money much better than you do. Today, we may not have the answers to privacy issues, but I believe our young people will come up with the solutions.
When Cameron said to me ‘you’re a dinosaur,’ several people in Parliament said to me ‘you’re trendin’, Dennis, you’re trendin’ – and I didn’t know what it meant. I know now what it is.
I was gratified to be able to answer promptly, and I did. I said I didn’t know.
It might be said now that I have the best of both worlds. A Harvard education and a Yale degree.
My father said there were two kinds of people in the world: givers and takers. The takers may eat better, but the givers sleep better.
My favorite film of all time is ‘Raising Arizona.’ I watched it again as soon as it was over. I had it on VHS, rented it, and I watched it and said, ‘I want to watch that again, right now.’ I think I did the same with something like ‘Goodfellas,’ which is a completely different genre.
The nude scenes were a little eerie and I felt a bit odd. Yeah, when the camera scanned up my body, I said to my friend, ‘Now, that’s a close-up.’ I mean, you see every inch of my body. But I’m okay with it and so it was cool.
My mom is from Ghana, and my dad is from the States, so even in my family when I was growing up, my mom said I was the American one, and my dad said I was the weird African one.
When I was around 18, I looked in the mirror and said, ‘You’re either going to love yourself or hate yourself.’ And I decided to love myself. That changed a lot of things.
I’ve always said it’s interesting to watch devils cry when angels want to stab you in the back. I like that mixture.
It is said that love makes the world go ’round – the announcement lacks verification. It’s wind from the dinner horn that does it.
My psychiatrist told me I was crazy and I said I want a second opinion. He said okay, you’re ugly too.
Hegel was right when he said that we learn from history that man can never learn anything from history.
Monopolists always defend their monopolies by arguing that competition is wasteful. When the railroad barons completed their monopoly, they argued it would be wasteful to have competing rail lines, AT&T said the same thing. But today, the size and scope of these monopolies is different.
I feel lazy when I’m not working. I learned all my business sense from my dad. He always believed in me, and I think the last thing he said to me before he passed away was, ‘I know you’re gonna be OK. I’m not worried about you’.
If I said it once, I’ll say it again: ‘We have the power to change everything.’
Culture is to know the best that has been said and thought in the world.
There is no subject so old that something new cannot be said about it.
I was about to walk on stage at the Kansas Speedway – I was playing a NASCAR race – and I said to Scooter Carusoe, who was standing side stage, ‘I want to write a song called ‘Wanna Be That Song.’ Then I put my earphones back in and walked right out on stage.
That money talks, I’ll not deny, I heard it once: It said, ‘Goodbye’.
When I told the people of Northern Ireland that I was an atheist, a woman in the audience stood up and said, ‘Yes, but is it the God of the Catholics or the God of the Protestants in whom you don’t believe?
Attachment and aversion are the root cause of karma, and karma originates from infatuation. Karma is the root cause of birth and death, and these are said to be the source of misery. None can escape the effect of their own past karma.
I have said, with respect to authorization bills, that I do not want the Congress or the country to commit fiscal suicide on the installment plan.
I never stop reading. I read everything, and I read every day. If you never read anything, be curious. Curiosity is the true foundation of education, reading things that we’ve factually already agreed on, and I love reading books. With that said, it’s more important that you ask the question ‘why.’
