It is no use painting the foot of the tree white, the strength of the bark cries out from beneath the paint.

Tonight I should like to thank all those who have shared my work and to acknowledge the debt that I owe to my wife whose encouragement to put research before all other things has been a great strength to me.

The strength of a nation, especially of a republican nation, is in the intelligent and well ordered homes of the people.

This is just what I have thought when I have seen slaves at work – they seem to go through the motions of labor without putting strength into them. They keep their powers in reserve for their own use at night, perhaps.

Strength lies not in defence but in attack.

The only reason I would stay away from a period piece is because sometimes the women are painted in a very stereotypical weakling, wallflower way – that’s something I don’t want to do. I want to show strength in the women I play, and a journey of some sort.

The great strength of the totalitarian state is that it forces those who fear it to imitate it.

Death used to announce itself in the thick of life but now people drag on so long it sometimes seems that we are reaching the stage when we may have to announce ourselves to death. It is as though one needs a special strength to die, and not a final weakness.

I saw him… at peace in my armchair. I remember wishing he could stay in peace like that forever. I had a feeling of easing his burden with my strength.

The strength of the United States is not the gold at Fort Knox or the weapons of mass destruction that we have, but the sum total of the education and the character of our people.