I never wanted to become an actress because I'd read great literature or seen great Shakespeare. It was more just wanting to understand what the people were really like why they said all the strange things they did.

A cloudy day or a little sunshine have as great an influence on many constitutions as the most recent blessings or misfortunes.

A weak mind is like a microscope which magnifies trifling things but cannot receive great ones.

Little progress can be made by merely attempting to repress what is evil. Our great hope lies in developing what is good.

I think that the good and the great are only separated by the willingness to sacrifice.

Great minds are to make others great. Their superiority is to be used not to break the multitude to intellectual vassalage not to establish over them a spiritual tyranny but to rouse them from lethargy and to aid them to judge for themselves.

All really great lovers are articulate and verbal seduction is the surest road to actual seduction.

What is most important for democracy is not that great fortunes should not exist but that great fortunes should not remain in the same hands. In that way there are rich men but they do not form a class.

Our actions seem to have their lucky and unlucky stars to which a great part of that blame and that commendation is due which is given to the actions themselves.

I am a great believer in luck and I find the harder I work the more I have of it.