You could construe abandoning all hope of results as being to your welfare. For example fame, renown, comfort, and happiness in this life, later happiness among gods or men, even the desire to achieve the transcendence of misery itself.

You could attach prices to thoughts. Some cost a lot, some a little. And how does one pay for thoughts? The answer, I think, is: with courage.

You confess your follies, indeed; but still you hug and cherish them; and no reformation can be hoped where there is no repentance.

You change the world by being yourself.

You cannot teach a man anything, you can only help him find it within himself.

You cannot struggle with men, not you, because at the very moment you are fighting, you keep thinking that your enemy might be right, and no matter what he does to you after that, you forgive him.

You cannot see the Milky Way in New York City any more ... We risk the loss of our sensual perception. And if you lose those, naturally, you try to compensate by other stimulations, by very loud noises, or by bright lights or drugs.

You cannot make yourself feel something you do not feel, but you can make yourself do right in spite of your feelings.

You cannot expect to enlighten more than one or two men for Ch'an is not so easy to understand. It will suffice to enlighten one or two.

You cannot expect the slave to show the virtues of the free man unless you first set him free.

You cannot do kindness too soon, for you never know how soon it will be too late.

You cannot believe in God until you believe in yourself.

You can’t try to change people without inflicting violence on them… Hitler and Stalin, in their own opinions, were acting for the benefit of humanity.

You can’t be so stuck up, so inhuman, that you want to be pure, your soul wrapped in a plastic bag.

You can't solve mysteries through guesswork. You start with what you know, and continue adding in more of what you know, until there is nothing left of what you know. Only then do yo even begin to add logic, reason, and speculation. Guessing is truly a last resort... an admission of failure.

You can't say civilization don't advance ... in every war they kill you in a new way

You can't prevent time passing. When something has passed, why do thoughts still loiter?

You can't measure time by days, the way you measure money by dollars and cents, because dollars are all the same while every day is different and maybe every hour as well.

You can't judge a book by its cover.

You can't have capitalism without racism.