My intellectual development was retarded, as a result of which I began to wonder about space and time only when I had already grown up.

Out yonder there was this huge world...which stands before us like a great eternal riddle.

The state is made for man, not man for the state.... That is to say, the state should be our servant and not we its slaves

Science is a wonderful thing if one does not have to earn one's living at it. One should earn one's living by work of which one is sure one is capable. Only when we do not have to be accountable to anybody can we find joy in scientific endeavor.

What I see in Nature is a magnificent structure that we can comprehend only very imperfectly, and that must fill a thinking person with a feeling of humility. This is a genuinely religious feeling that has nothing to do with mysticism.

I do not share the crusading spirit of the professional atheist whose fervor is mostly due to a painful act of liberation from the fetters of religious indoctrination received in youth. I prefer an attitude of humility corresponding to the weakness of our intellectual understanding of nature and of our own being.

In my experience, the best creative work is never done when one is unhappy.