Paying tax should be framed as a glorious civic duty worthy of gratitude - not a punishment for making money. - Alain de Botton

Philosophy, art, politics, religion and bohemia have never sought to do away entirely with the status hierarchy; they have attemptee, rather, to institute new kinds of hierarchies based on sets of values unrecognised by, and critical of, those of the majority.. They have provided us with persuasive and consoling reminders that there is more than one way of succeeding in life.

A notorious inability to express emotions makes human beings the only animals capable of suicide.

He was marked out by his relentless ability to find fault with others' mediocrity — suggesting that a certain type of intelligence may be at heart nothing more or less than a superior capacity for dissatisfaction.