The way in which the persecution of Galileo has been remembered is a tribute to the quiet commencement of the most intimate change in outlook which the human race had yet encountered. Since a babe was born in a manger, it may be doubted whether so great a thing has happened with so little stir

Each generation criticizes the unconscious assumptions made by its parent. It may assent to them, but it brings them out in the open.

The study of mathematics is apt to commence in disappointment... We are told that by its aid the stars are weighed and the billions of molecules in a drop of water are counted. Yet, like the ghost of Hamlet's father, this great science eludes the efforts of our mental weapons to grasp it.

Aristotle discovered all the half-truths which were necessary to the creation of science.

There is no greater hindrance to the progress of thought than an attitude of irritated party-spirit.

Wisdom alone is true ambition's aim, wisdom is the source of virtue and of fame; obtained with labour, for mankind employed, and then, when most you share it, best enjoyed.

The merely well-informed man is the most useless bore on God's earth.