For some reason which I have failed to understand, many people like the system [scientific totalitarianism] when it is Russian but disliked the very same system when it was German. I am compelled to think that this is due to the power of labels; these people like whatever is labelled ‘Left’ without examining whether the label has any justification.

Do not use power to suppress opinions you think pernicious, for if you do the opinions will suppress you.

Orthodoxy is the death of intelligence.

A good world needs knowledge, kindliness, and courage; it does not need a regretful hankering after the past or a fettering of the free intelligence by the words uttered long ago by ignorant men.

If a philosophy is to bring happiness it should be inspired by kindly feelings. Marx pretended that he wanted the happiness of the proletariat; what he really wanted was the unhappiness of the bourgeois.

If one lived for ever the joys of life would inevitably in the end lose their savour. As it is, they remain perennially fresh.

Government can easily exist without laws, but law cannot exist without government.