All the history of human life has been a struggle between wisdom and stupidity.

― Philip Pullman, The Amber Spyglass

I write almost always in the third person, and I don't think the narrator is male or female anyway. They're both, and young and old, and wise and silly, and sceptical and credulous, and innocent and experienced, all at once. Narrators are not even human - they're sprites.

― Philip Pullman

I stopped believing there was a power of good and a power of evil that were outside us. And I came to believe that good and evil are names for what people do, not for what they are.
― Philip Pullman, The Amber Spyglass

You cannot change what you are, only what you do.     
― Philip Pullman, The Golden Compass

We don’t need a list of rights and wrongs, tables of dos and don’ts: we need books, time, and silence. Thou shalt not is soon forgotten, but Once upon a time lasts forever.  

 ― Philip Pullman

After nourishment, shelter and companionship, stories are the thing we need most in the world.
― Philip Pullman

Writing is a process that’s entirely totalitarian. A writer is a tyrant, a dictator. He has complete power over every comma, every sentence, every character. When I’m writing, I’m the boss — I’m in charge. When the book is published, the political nature of it changes completely. People can read my books in whatever way they want to. I don’t want any control over the process of reading, it’s democratic: and furthermore, between the reader and the book there opens up a space of complete freedom, which is also private. In a democracy, we have a private voting booth. It’s secret. So the difference between reading and writing is the difference between democracy and tyranny. 

PHILIP PULLMAN

Making your mark on the world is hard. If it were easy, everybody would do it. But it's not. It takes patience, it takes commitment, and it comes with plenty of failure along the way. The real test is not whether you avoid this failure, because you won't. it's whether you let it harden or shame you into inaction, or whether you learn from it; whether you choose to persevere.
― Barack Obama

What I’ve realized is that life doesn’t count for much unless you’re willing to do your small part to leave our children — all of our children — a better world. Any fool can have a child. That doesn’t make you a father. It’s the courage to raise a child that makes you a father.
― Barack Obama

Focusing your life solely on making a buck shows a poverty of ambition. It asks too little of yourself. And it will leave you unfulfilled.   ― Barack Obama

If there's a child on the south side of Chicago who can't read, that matters to me, even if it's not my child. If there's a senior citizen somewhere who can't pay for their prescription, who has to choose between medicine and the rent, that makes my life poorer - even if it's not my grandparent. If there's an Arab-American or Mexican-American family being rounded up by John Ashcroft without benefit of an attorney or due process, I know that that threatens my civil liberties. And I don't have to be a woman to be concerned that the Supreme Court is trying to take away a woman's right, because I know that my rights are next. It is that fundamental belief - I am my brother’s keeper, I am my sister’s keeper - that makes this country work.
― Barack Obama

I'm inspired by the people I meet in my travels--hearing their stories, seeing the hardships they overcome, their fundamental optimism and decency. I'm inspired by the love people have for their children. And I'm inspired by my own children, how full they make my heart. They make me want to work to make the world a little bit better. And they make me want to be a better man.

― Barack Obama

 It is well to be up before daybreak, for such habits contribute to health, wealth, and wisdom.

 — Aristotle

Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.

 — Benjamin Franklin, published in Poor Richard's Almanack.

A good laugh and a long sleep are the best cures in the doctor’s book. 

Irish proverb

The greatest of follies is to sacrifice health for any other kind of happiness. Arthur Schopenhauer

 Before healing others, heal yourself. Gambian saying

 He who has health has hope; and he who has hope has everything. Arabian proverb

 Exercise is king. Nutrition is queen. Put them together and you’ve got a kingdom. Jack LaLanne

 A sad soul can kill you quicker than a germ. John Steinbeck