[The human control of atomic energy could] virtually provide anyone who wanted it with a private sun of his own.

But what sin is to the moralist and crime to the jurist so to the scientific man is ignorance.

It is curious to reflect, for example, upon the remarkable legend of the Philosopher's Stone, one of the oldest and most universal beliefs, the origin of which, however far back we penetrate into the records of the past, we do not probably trace its real source.

The history of man is dominated by, and reflects, the amount of available energy

Heat energy of uniform temperature [is] the ultimate fate of all energy. The power of sunlight and coal, electric power, water power, winds and tides do the work of the world, and in the end all unite to hasten the merry molecular dance.

The energy available for each individual man is his income, and the philosophy which can teach him to be content with penury should be capable of teaching him also the uses of wealth.

There has been no discovery like it in the history of man. It puts into man's hands the key to using the fundamental energy of the universe.