The purest moment, tranquil hour of Earth's expectancy. We lay on the soft rose sands beside the sleeping sea in happy land of fragrant meadows I dreamed a dream of. The whisper of the tide, the sighing of the trees. You gentle silver song births my ...
I entered Princeton University as a graduate student in 1959, when the Department of Mathematics was housed in the old Fine Hall. This legendary facility was marvellous in stimulating interaction among the graduate students and between the graduate s...
Whether that lady's gentle mind, No longer with the form combined Which scattered love, as stars do light, Found sadness where it left delight, I dare not guess; but in this life Of error, ignorance, and strife, Where nothing is, but all things seem,...
The best way to avoid being confused about Bruce Jenner is get your head out of his bedroom and closet, and then think about all of the things you've been hiding and been miserable about. So what he made his announcement via media. Books, music, movi...
Where had I heard this wind before Change like this to a deeper roar? What would it take my standing there for, Holding open a restive door, Looking down hill to a frothy shore? Summer was past and day was past. Somber clouds in the west were massed....
Burnout at its deepest level is not the result of some train wreck of examinations, long call shifts, or poor clinical evaluations. It is the sum total of hundreds and thousands of tiny betrayals of purpose, each one so minute that it hardly attracts...
Don't be fool enough to think you can know a person's character after a few moments of observation. You have no idea where his life began or how his saga has unfolded thus far. Only his present state can you witness. To judge him at a glance is like ...
You think I read your thoughts, but it's your eyes that speak to me. When they glisten with moisture, I see a depth of emotion stirring behind them. One tearful glance begs me for a reassuring embrace. When your gaze glazes over like a misty morning,...
An evolutionary perspective of our place in the history of the earth reminds us that Homo sapiens sapiens has occupied the planet for the tiniest fraction of that planet's four and a half thousand million years of existence. In many ways we are a bio...
When people ask me if a god created the universe, I tell them that the question itself makes no sense. Time didn’t exist before the big bang, so there is no time for god to make the universe in. It’s like asking directions to the edge of the eart...
Are you really surprised by the endurance of religion? What ideology is likely to be more durable than one that conforms, at every turn, to our powers of wishful thinking? Hope is easy; knowledge is hard. Science is the one domain in which we human b...
Been eating candies, have you?" "You sent those?" She kept her mouth closed as much as possible. "Of course." He picked up the brown bad of candy on the table. "What's your..." He trailed off as he weighed the bad in his hands. "Didn't I give you thr...
I know that life is busy and hard and that there's crushing pressure to just settle down and get a real job and khaki pants and a haircut. But don't. Please don't. Please keep believing that life can be better, brighter, broader because of the art th...
I can't stop thinking about what he felt like against my body, against my lips. I can't remember anything else, anything before that. And I realize in this moment that I've finally done it. That horrible, awful thing I swore I would never do. The fro...
With me, the present is forever, and forever is always shifting, flowing, melting. This second is life. And when it is gone it is dead. But you can’t start over with each new second. You have to judge by what is dead. It’s like quicksand … hope...
2Yes. And as for money it’s only mankind’s most important invention. With respect to money I think everyone has received fair warning. Money is the reason you have no responsibility to that starving girl. It is simply the single most important en...
While the bodies of young children are usually relaxed and flexible, if experiences of fear are continuous over the years, chronic tightening happens. Our shoulders may become permanently knotted and raised, our head thrust forward, our back hunched,...
It was all I could do not to fall on my knees and weep like the bastard she always said I was, and I was a breath away from begging her to run away with me. I can’t believe I’m admitting this on tape—I was standing at that table, she hit me wit...
When I took over as chair of the fashion program, I was horrified that only the faculty member was allowed to speak in a critique. I'm talking about perfectly nurturing teachers. But the rule was there would be no call of hands for students to contri...
Where is it written in the Constitution that because a guy played football, he has the automatic right to sit in that booth? How hard is football? If I've spent thirty-five years as a sportswriter, you think I don't know you get six for a touchdown? ...
In thinking about these questions I have been stimulated by criticisms of the prevailing scientific world picture... by the defenders of intelligent design. Even though writers like and are motivated at least in part by their religious beliefs, the e...