As men begin to grow civilized, they cease to be satisfied with mere taboos.

Orthodoxy is the death of intelligence.

The method of "postulating" what we want has many advantages; they are the same as the advantages of theft over honest toil.

Insight, untested and unsupported, is an uncertain guarantee of the truth.

My own view on religion is . . . It helped in early days to fix the calendar, and . . . to chronicle eclipses . . . These two services I am prepared to acknowledge.

It is not my prayer and humility that you cause things to go as you wish, but by acquiring a knowledge of natural laws.

Another merit of home is that it preserves the diversity between individuals. If we were all alike, it might be convenient for the bureaucrat and the statistician, but it would be very dull, and would lead to a very unprogressive society.