I remember discussions with which went through many hours till very late at night and ended almost in despair; and when at the end of the discussion I went alone for a walk in the neighbouring park I repeated to myself again and again the question: ?
Forgive me, my sons. I've been defeated by this despicable idiot. This is as far as I go. I leave everything to you. You have my gratitude. Farewell, my sons.
We see it [the as-yet unseen, probable new planet, Neptune] as Columbus saw America from the coast of Spain. Its movements have been felt, trembling along the far-reaching line of our analysis with a certainty hardly inferior to that of ocular demons...
Modern fanaticism thrives in proportion to the quanitity of contradictions and nonsense it poures down the throats of the gaping multitude, and the jargon and mysticism it offers to their wonder and credulity.
The wild things of this earth are not ours to do with as we please. They have been given to us in trust, and we must account for them to the generation which will come after us and audit our accounts.
A recognized fact which goes back to the earliest times is that every living organism is not the sum of a multitude of unitary processes, but is, by virtue of interrelationships and of higher and lower levels of control, an unbroken unity. When resea...
It is the conquest of this fear that adds half the charm to climbing.
All of those things - rock and men and river - resisted change, resisted the coming as they did the going. Hood warmed and rose slowly, breaking open the plain, and cooled slowly over the plain it buried. The nature of things is resistance to change,...
Your film is like your children. You might want a child with certain qualities, but you are never going to get the exact specification right. The film has a privilege to live its own life and develop its own character. To suppress this is dangerous. ...
The wishbone will never replace the backbone
Danger is a good teacher, and makes apt scholars. So are disgrace, defeat, exposure to immediate scorn and laughter. There is no opportunity in such cases for self-delusion, no idling time away, no being off your guard (or you must take the consequen...
We enjoy the night, the darkness, where we can do things that aren't acceptable in the light. Night is when we slake our thirst.
As we learn about each other, so we learn about ourselves
I have looked further into space than ever human being did before me. I have observed stars of which the light, it can be proved, must take two million years to reach the earth. [ .]
By reflecting a little on this subject I am almost convinced that those numberless small Circuses we see on the moon are the works of the Lunarians and may be called their Towns.
If you’re purely after facts, please buy yourself the phone directory of Manhattan. It has four million times correct facts. But it doesn’t illuminate.
Faith can be interested in results only, for a truth once recognized as such puts an end to the believer's thinking.
Lest others should attempt the ascent of this terrible climb and perish, they swore themselves to secrecy (telling only enough people to ensure the perpetuation of their epic) and went off to try Everest instead.
For such an advanced civilization as ours to be without images that are adequate to it is as serious a defect as being without memory.
Shall I faint, now that I have poured out the spirit of my mind to the world, and treated many subjects with truth, with freedom, with power, because I have been followed with one cry of abuse ever since
The greatest glory of a free-born people is to transmit that freedom to their children.
