Words of Wisdom: Celeb Commencement Speeches!

"So what I ask of you, graduates, as you walk out of here today is this: Pursue success. Do not falter. When you make it, pull somebody else up. Preserve our dream. Remember your life is richer when people around you have a shot at opportunity as well. Strive to widen that circle of possibility; strive to forge that big, generous, optimistic vision of America that we inherited; strive to carry that dream forward to future generations."

"I was wearing this exact signed, decorated orange and black jacket," Shields said, modeling her Class of 1987 jacket, of her graduation from Princeton. "My hair was huge. My Reeboks white. My jeans acid washed. You were not even born."

"Getting out of your comfort zone can be, well, uncomfortable…today is just the first of many graduations in your life."

"This country needs your help. You have the tools to change lives. There's no limit to what you can do. Better people's lives or liberate your countrymen. You have the power. Use it not just to do good, but to bring morality to the law… As I’ve grown older, I believe I would trade what I have for what you will have tomorrow afternoon."

"Just because you're wicked smart doesn't mean you’re better than me. I graduated from BC (Boston College): 'The Harvard of Boston.' Though we all know, Harvard is the Harvard of Harvard."

"I am myself a storyteller, and therefore, an optimist—a firm believer in the ethical bend of the human heart; a believer in the mind’s appetite for truth and its disgust with fraud and selfishness. From my point of view, your life is already a miracle of chance waiting for you to shape its destiny. From my point of view, your life is already artful -- waiting, just waiting, for you to make it art."

"The world we live in is too unequal. What they [poorer countries] need are systems, things you take for granted. We would be shocked if the microphone failed or the lights went out today, but I spend a lot of my life in places where people take none of that for granted. They need systems, and a lot of you have worked in places where you see young people just as intelligent as you are, just as hard working as you are, they simply don’t have like chances because they don’t have the systems to guarantee good consequences for hard work and good behavior."



"The problem with all countries that have great systems is that they get long in the tooth. That they become so successful that those who run them are more interested in holding onto their positions than advancing the purposes for which they were established. More interested in maintaining the gains of the present than achieving even greater ones for our children in the future"

"I had to come exactly because I might make a fool of myself," said Washington. "I've found that nothing in life is worthwhile unless you take risks. Nothing."

"I know many of you were convinced that last night at about 6 o’clock local time that the world was going to come to an end. Just because it hasn't, doesn't mean its not near by, because my appearing here today at Yale University is surely one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse"

Celebrities and political figures have got a lot of knowledge to pass on to today's future leaders. Take a look at some of the pearls of wisdom, words of inspiration and flat-out funny things they have passed on during various commencement speeches delivered to this year's graduating class of 2011.