The human spirit needs to accomplish, to achieve, to triumph to be happy.

- Ben Stein

So, who in the media is without sin among us? I am in the media and I am a major league sinner. I don't know anyone except my wife who isn't a big time sinner.

- Ben Stein

It's amazing what ordinary people can do if they set out without preconceived notions.

- Ben Stein

It's really amazing that in the age of unbelief, as a smart man called it, there isn't even more fraud. After all, with no God, there's no one to ever call you to account, and no accounting at all if you can get away with it.

- Ben Stein

I was a trial lawyer. At the same time, I was a teacher. I taught about the political and social content of film for American University. Then I left and became a teacher at the University of California at Santa Cruz. I taught about the political and social content of film, but I also taught a course in law for undergraduates.

- Ben Stein

Darwinism doesn't explain where gravity comes from. It doesn't explain where thermodynamics comes from. It doesn't explain where the laws of physics come from. It doesn't explain where matter came from.

- Ben Stein

Jump into the middle of things, get your hands dirty, fall flat on your face, and then reach for the stars.

- Ben Stein

Every soul deserves a shot at a Cadillac, but not everyone should be guaranteed a Cadillac.

- Ben Stein

If you can't stand the heat, don't go to Cancun in the summer.

- Ben Stein

Wow, bad news. Mr. Obama now hates Israel because the Israelis want to build 1,600 apartments in their own capital city, Jerusalem. Russia hates Israel, too. So do the Europeans. So does Ban Ki-moon, a Korean who is secretary-general of the UN.

- Ben Stein

I don't like getting pushed around for being a Jew, and I don't think Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians. I think people who believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period.

- Ben Stein

You must take the first step. The first steps will take some effort, maybe pain. But after that, everything that has to be done is real-life movement.

- Ben Stein

When I seemed to be irritable or sad, my father would quote the learned Dr. Knight, and then say, 'Just go to sleep.' Like all smart aleck kids, I thought the advice was silly. But as I've grown older, I've realized just how smart Knight was.

- Ben Stein

I do all of the grocery shopping in my little family. I buy cheese, of many different kinds, sliced packaged meats and poultry, bagels, immense quantities of eggs, pre-made fried chicken. Milk. Bacon. It is insane how much dairy, deli and bakery stuff I buy.

- Ben Stein

I don't believe the most successful people are the ones who got the best grades, got into the best schools, or made the most money.

- Ben Stein

Screaming at children over their grades, especially to the point of the child's tears, is child abuse, pure and simple. It's not funny and it's not good parenting. It is a crushing, scarring, disastrous experience for the child. It isn't the least bit funny.

- Ben Stein

My parents, products of the Great Depression, were successful people, but lived in a state of constant fear that my sister and I, and they, would sink into the kind of economic insecurity that their generation knew so well.

- Ben Stein

The indispensable first step to getting the things you want out of life is this: decide what you want.

- Ben Stein

Sleep makes people calmer, more alert, less fearful - just plain happier, or so I see around me and in me. I am sure that if this great nation were to concentrate on getting more sleep, we would be a happier, more confident people, and that by itself would be a major achievement.

- Ben Stein

After all the black man has been through in this world, he can still often reach levels of spirituality the most pampered white man cannot touch. Maybe what he's been through is the reason why.

- Ben Stein