In an adequate social order, the untalented should be able to acquire a sense of usefulness and of growth without interfering with the development of talent around them

There is nothing more explosive than a skilled population condemned to inaction. Such a population is likely to become a hotbed of extremism and intolerance, and be receptive to any proselytizing ideology, however absurd and vicious, which promises vast action.

More significant than the fact that poets write abstrusely, painters paint abstractly, and composers compose unintelligible music is that people should admire what they cannot understand; indeed, admire that which has no meaning or principle.

When cowardice is made respectable, its followers are without number both from among the weak and the strong; it easily becomes a fashion.

Take away hatred from some people, and you have men without faith.

There are no chaste minds. Minds copulate wherever they meet.

You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.