Teachers should be very careful not to spoil their pupils' taste for poetry for all time by making it a task and an imposition.

Optimism is true moral courage.

(Was he talking about a polar expedition, or marriage?) -Jorge Men Wanted: For hazardous journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in case of success.

I chose life over death for myself and my friends... I believe it is in our nature to explore, to reach out into the unknown. The only true failure would be not to explore at all.

We had seen God in His splendors, heard the text that Nature renders. We had reached the naked soul of man.

Life to me is the greatest of all games. The danger lies in treating it as a trivial game, a game to be taken lightly, and a game in which the rules don't matter much. The rules matter a great deal. The game has to be played fairly or it is no game at all. And even to win the game is not the chief end. The chief end is to win it honorably and splendidly.

From the sentimental point of view, it is the last great Polar journey that can be made.