I write to discover what I think.

A best-seller was a book which somehow sold well because it was selling well.

Modern tourist guides have helped raised tourist expectations. And they have provided the natives- from Kaiser Wilhelm down to the villagers of Chichacestenango - with a detailed and itemized list of what is expected of them and when. These are the up-to-date scripts for actors on the tourists' stage.

The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance - it is the illusion of knowledge.

Standing, standing, standing - why do I have to stand all the time? That is the main characteristic of social Washington.

Our discontent begins by finding false villains whom we can accuse of deceiving us. Next we find false heroes whom we expect to liberate us. The hardest, most discomfiting discovery is that each of us must emancipate himself.

The mind is a vagrant thing.... Thinking is not analogous to a person working in a laboratory who invents something on company time.