Great ambition, the desire of real superiority, of leading and directing, seems to be altogether peculiar to man, and speech is the great instrument of ambition.
Adam Smith

He was seriously thinking of becoming a monk. He thought he had to be celibate to maintain the purity of his instrument, but my instrument needed tuning, and we had to split.
Mimi Rogers

Human memory is a marvelous but fallacious instrument. The memories which lie within us are not carved in stone; not only do they tend to become erased as the years go by, but often they change, or even increase by incorporating extraneous features.
Primo Levi

I am concerned about the whole man. I am concerned about what the people, using their government as an instrument and a tool, can do toward building the whole man, which will mean a better society and a better world.
Lyndon B. Johnson

I approach playing acoustic guitar more of as a percussive instrument. It's fragile. I don't have a lot of finesse when it comes to my guitar playing.
Billie Joe Armstrong

I asked my mother could I have an instrument. She said, 'Well if you go out and save your money.' So I went and got - I made me a shine box. I went out and started shining shoes, and I'd bring whatever I made.
Ornette Coleman

I believe in using the entire piano as a single instrument capable of expressing every possible musical idea.
Oscar Peterson

I can do a gig without an instrument.
Gavin DeGraw

I can play any instrument if you give me 20 minutes.
Brittany Murphy

I can play every instrument there is, every horn, I've played all the saxes and trumpets and everything and keyboards.
Dick Dale

I conceived of an instrument that would create sound without using any mechanical energy, like the conductor of an orchestra. The orchestra plays mechanically, using mechanical energy; the conductor just moves his hands, and his movements have an effect on the music artistry.
Leon Theremin

I didn't want to get attached to one guitar; I didn't want to have an instrument that was irreplaceable.
Robin Trower

I feel like you're not a real musician or entertainer if you can't go into a room, pick up an instrument and entertain people.
Chris Cornell

I found it liberating of necessity to devise my own style and my own tactics and to look for a voice on the instrument because there weren't really any that impacted strongly on me.
Steve Swallow

I got into television because I hated it so. I thought, there's some way of using this fabulous instrument to be of nurture to those who would watch and listen.
Jeff Greenfield

I like to use the audience as my color palette, my instrument.
Bobby McFerrin

I like to work my camera as if it were a musical instrument.
Mike Figgis

I listen to other guitar players, yeah. It gives me new concepts and shows me where the instrument is going for the future and it is going some places. There are some musicians who are really putting out a good vibe with new theories. I try and keep up.
George Benson

I listened to many different types of instruments and music, and have always tried to look at the bass as an instrument as opposed to only a bass.
Billy Sheehan

I mean, if you decided to go out today and get you an instrument and do whatever it is that you do, no one can tell you how you're going to do it but when you do it.
Ornette Coleman