“I don’t think of all the misery, but of the beauty that still remains.”
“Think of all the beauty still left around you and be happy.”
“No one has ever become poor by giving.”
“How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before beginning to improve the world.”
“Death destroys a man: the idea of death saves him.”
“Life is easy to chronicle, but bewildering to practice.”
“As for my politics, you will have guessed that I am not a Fascist.”
“What is wonderful about great literature is that it transforms the man who reads it.”
“Think before you speak is criticism’s motto; speak before you think is creation’s.”
“The only books that influence us are those for which we are ready.”
“To make us feel small in the right way is a function of art; men can only make us feel small in the wrong way.”
“A humanist has four leading characteristics—curiosity, a free mind, belief in good taste, and belief in the human race.”
“Tolerance, good temper and sympathy—they are what matter really.”
“We are willing enough to praise freedom when she is safely tucked away in the past and cannot be a nuisance.”
“For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.”
“I would rather have questions that can’t be answered than answers that can’t be questioned.”
“Physics is like sex: sure, it may give some practical results, but that’s not why we do it.”
“The pleasure of finding things out.”
“What do you care what other people think?”
“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself—and you are the easiest person to fool.”