Every man is the son of his own works.

There is no method but to be very intelligent.

Art to me 

is an anecdote of the spirit, 

and the only means 

of making concrete 

the purpose 

of its varied quickness 

and stillness.

Why do you speak to me of the stones? 

It is only the arch that matters to me.

Nobody heard him, 

the dead man, 

But still he lay moaning. 

I was much further out than you thought, 

and not waving but drowning. 

I was much too far out all my life, 

And not waving but drowning.

Utopias are presented for our inspection as a critique of the human state.

No man was ever great by imitation.

They that apply themselves to trifling matters 

commonly become incapable of great ones.

I have always been delighted at the prospect of a new day, 

a fresh try, 

one more start, 

with perhaps a bit of magic
waiting somewhere behind the morning.

Myth is an attempt to narrate a whole human experience, 

of which the purpose is too deep, 

going too deep in the blood and soul, 

for mental explanation or description.

From the intrinsic evidence of his creation, 

the Great Architect of the Universe 

now begins to appear 

as a pure mathematician.

The analysis of concepts is for the understanding 

nothing more than 

what the magnifying glass is for sight.

The more original a discovery, 

the more obvious it seems afterwards.

Imagination is but another name for super intelligence.

Elegance is inferior to virtue.

All the knowledge I possess 

everyone else can acquire, 

but my heart is all my own.

When liberty is mentioned, 

we must always be careful to observe 

whether it is not really the assertion of private interests 

which is thereby designated.

Good sense about trivialities 

is better than 

nonsense about things that matter.

Words are also seeds, 

and when dropped into the invisible spiritual substance, 

they grow and bring forth after their kind.

If religion were true, 

its followers would not try to bludgeon their young 

into an artificial conformity; 

but would merely insist 

on their unbending quest for truth, 

irrespective of artificial backgrounds 

or practical consequences.

By education most have been misled; 

So they believe, because they were bred. 

The priest continues where the nurse began, 

And thus the child imposes on the man.

Solitude, 

though it may be silent as light, 

is like light, 

the mightiest of agencies; 

for solitude is essential to man. 

All men come into this world alone 

and leave it alone.

The more opinions you have, 

the less you see.

Quantum physics thus reveals a basic oneness of the universe.

Life has a practice of living you, 

if you don't live it.

Science and fun cannot be separated.

To strive, to seek, to find, 

and not to yield.

The man of virtuous soul commands not, 

nor obeys.

There is no quality in this world 

that is not what it is 

merely by contrast. 

Nothing exists in itself.

Proud people breed sad sorrows for themselves.

Those who promise us paradise on earth never produced anything but a hell.

I have wandered all my life, 

and I have also travelled;
the difference between the two being this,
that we wander for distraction,
but we travel for fulfilment.

The word 'belief' is a difficult thing for me. 

I don't believe. 

I must have a reason for a certain hypothesis. 

Either I know a thing, 

and then I know it — 

I don't need to believe it.

Genius not only diagnoses the situation 

but supplies the answers.

They never taste 

who always drink: 

They always talk, 

who never think.

Follow your honest convictions 

and be strong.

There is no expedient to which a man will not go 

to avoid the labour of thinking.

The adjustment of reality to the masses 

and of the masses to reality 

is a process of unlimited scope, 

as much for thinking 

as for perception.

Do what you love. 

Know your own bone; 

gnaw at it, 

bury it, 

unearth it, 

and gnaw it still.

We read deeply for varied reasons, 

most of them familiar: 

that we cannot know enough people profoundly enough; 

that we need to know ourselves better; 

that we require knowledge, 

not just of self and others, 

but of the way things are.

In order to more fully understand this reality, 

we must take into account other dimensions of a broader reality.

Today, 

more than ever before, 

life must be characterised by a sense of Universal responsibility, 

not only nation to nation 

and human to human, 

but also human to other forms of life.

Happiness in this world, 

when it comes, 

comes incidentally. 

Make it the object of pursuit, 

and it leads us a wild-goose chase, 

and is never attained. 

Follow some other object, 

and very possibly 

we may find that we have caught happiness 

without dreaming of it.

Solitude is independence.

Try to keep your soul young and quivering right up to old age.

It is a mania shared by philosophers of all ages 

to deny what exists 

and to explain what does not exist.

The true measure of a man 

is what he would do 

if he knew he would never be caught.

Things are the way they are 

because they were the way they were.

I am more and more convinced 

that our happiness or our unhappiness depends 

far more on the way we meet the events of life 

than on the nature of those events themselves.