David Rockefeller

One cannot expect to coast along and rise automatically to the top, no matter what friends you may have in the company. There may have been a time when, in large corporations, a person could rise simply because he had a stock interest or because he had friends in top management. That’s not true today. Success in business requires training and discipline and hard work. But if you’re not frightened by these things, the opportunities are just as great today as they ever were.

I do not like to be unkind.

I hope the Guggenheim plan will be revived.

The conventional notions of art have changed, and a lot of things done today are considered works of art that would have been rejected in the past.

By a museum, I assume you mean an institution dedicated to the events of Sept. 11 and the aftermath. If that is done with sensitivity, I think it would be most appropriate.

I learned more from my mother than from all the art historians and curators who have informed me about technical aspects of art history and art appreciation over the years.

I hate quotations. Tell me what you know.

Whenever you find that you are on the side of the majority, it is time to reform.

The more you know, the more you realise how much you don’t know — the less you know, the more you think you know.

The Internet is just bringing all kinds of information into the home. There’s just a lot of distraction, a lot of competition for the parent’s voice to resonate in the children’s ears.

Getting over a painful experience is much like crossing monkey bars. You have to let go at some point in order to move forward.

If someone thinks that love and peace is a cliche that must have been left behind in the Sixties, that’s his problem. Love and peace are eternal.

We have finished the job, what shall we do with the tools?

In this life you have to learn to get up because the road is full of stones.

Every one knows that insufficient rest and gorging are not good for anyone, either physically or mentally.

Fight for your opinions, but do not believe that they contain the whole truth, or the only truth.

The books that the world calls immoral are the books that show the world its own shame.

There are certain things we come into this world having to defeat.

All men are frauds. The only difference between them is that some admit it. I myself deny it.

Coming together is the beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success.

I lie and tell you I had a dream about you last night, so it makes it more socially acceptable to reach out to someone I haven’t spoken to in years.