I made a supreme effort not to do that thing that parents do which is to bore people without children to death by going on and on about how funny their children are so there's none of that hopefully.

It's an incredible con job when you think about it to believe something now in exchange for something after death. Even corporations with their reward systems don't try to make it posthumous.

Policemen so cherish their status as keepers of the peace and protectors of the public that they have occasionally been known to beat to death those citizens or groups who question that status.

Monarchs ought to put to death the authors and instigators of war as their sworn enemies and as dangers to their states.

The Greeks said grandly in their tragic phrase 'Let no one be called happy till his death' to which I would add 'Let no one till his death be called unhappy.'

I'm sick to death of famous people standing up and using their celebrity to promote a cause. If I see a particular need I do try to help. But there's a lot that can be achieved by putting a check in the right place and shutting up about it.

The death of Pope John Paul II led many of different faiths and of no faith to acknowledge their debt to the Roman Catholic Church for holding on to absolutes that the rest of us can measure ourselves against.

The passion of hatred is so long lived and so obstinate a malady that the surest sign of death in a sick person is their desire for reconciliation.

Talk to people in their own language. If you do it well they'll say 'God he said exactly what I was thinking.' And when they begin to respect you they'll follow you to the death.

I mean in the South African case many of those who were part of death squads would have been respectable members of their white community people who went to church on Sunday every Sunday.