The heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing.

Pride slays thanksgiving but a humble mind is the soil out of which thanks naturally grow. A proud man is seldom a grateful man for he never thinks he gets as much as he deserves.

Being Irish he had an abiding sense of tragedy which sustained him through temporary periods of joy.

I know. I'm lazy. But I made myself a New Years resolution that I would write myself something really special. Which means I have 'til December right?

I've also just finished filming the role of Robert Brown in 'Just William ' which is due to transmit on BBC One at Christmas.

Chum was a British boy's weekly which at the end of the year was bound into a single huge book and the following Christmas parents bought it as Christmas presents for male children.

Brits and Americans have hundreds of different phrases for the same thing. Luckily it's usually a source of amusement rather than frustration. A flashlight by any other name is still a torch. My personal favourite is 'fairy lights ' which we boringly refer to as 'Christmas lights.'

Now I'm an old Christmas tree the roots of which have died. They just come along and while the little needles fall off me replace them with medallions.

We can create the ultimate job security by becoming less dependent on the organization for which we work and more dependent on our own resources.

Work is the price which is paid for reputation.

These days I'm mostly familiar with two parts of L.A.: one is movie culture and the other is Asian culture. The Westside is work and the Eastside is Chinese - which means my friends.

I love my work with a frenetic and perverse love as an ascetic loves the hair shirt which scratches his belly.

The test of the artist does not lie in the will with which he goes to work but in the excellence of the work he produces.

Blessed is the man who has some congenial work some occupation in which he can put his heart and which affords a complete outlet to all the forces there are in him.

Whatever you do do it with all your might. Work at it early and late in season and out of season not leaving a stone unturned and never deferring for a single hour that which can be done just as well now.

Individuality is founded in feeling and the recesses of feeling the darker blinder strata of character are the only places in the world in which we catch real fact in the making and directly perceive how events happen and how work is actually done.

It's not the work which kills people it's the worry. It's not the revolution that destroys machinery it's the friction.