Punctuality is a quality the need of which is bound up with social co-operation. It has nothing to do with the relation of the soul to God, or with mystic insight, or with any of the matters with which the more elevated and spiritual moralists are concerned.

The human animal, like others, is adapted to a certain amount of struggle for life [and] the mere absence of effort from his life removes an essential ingredient of happiness. [. . .] He forgets that to be without some of the things you want is an indispensable part of happiness.

Mathematics may be defined as the subject in which we never know what we are talking about, nor whether what we are saying is true.

There is no difference between someone who eats too little and sees Heaven and someone who drinks too much and sees snakes.

Real life is, to most men, a long second best, a perpetual compromise between the ideal and the possible.

Too little liberty brings stagnation, and too much brings chaos.

If you had the power to destroy the world, would you do so?