If he who breaks the law is not punished, he who obeys it is cheated. This, and this alone, is why lawbreakers ought to be punished: to authenticate as good, and to encourage as useful, law-abiding behavior. The aim of criminal law cannot be correction or deterrence; it can only be the maintenance of the legal order.

Mental illness is a myth, whose function is to disguise and thus render more palatable the bitter pill of moral conflicts in human relations.

Man cannot long survive without air, water, and sleep. Next in importance comes food. And close on its heels, solitude.

When a person can no longer laugh at himself, it is time for others to laugh at him.

Addiction, obesity, starvation (anorexia nervosa) are political problems, not psychiatric: each condense and expresses a contest between the individual and some other person or persons in his environment over the control of the individual's body.

Work is pushing matter around. Politics is pushing people around.

What people really need and demand from life is not wealth, comfort, or esteem, but games worth playing