When the mind grapples with a great and intricate problem, it makes its advances step by step, with but little realization of the gains it has made, until suddenly, with an effect of abrupt illumination, it realizes its victory.

Affliction comes to us, not to make us sad but sober; not to make us sorry but wise.

How small the vastest of human catastrophes may seem, at a distance of a few million miles.

It sounds plausible enough tonight, but wait until tomorrow. Wait for the common sense of the morning.

We live in reference to past experience and not to future events, however inevitable.

If I am recalling an incident very vividly I go back to the instant of its occurrence; I become absent minded, as you say. I jump back for a moment. Of course we have no means of staying back for any length of time any more than a savage or an animal has of staying six feet above the ground. But a civilized man is better off than the savage in this respect. He can go up against gravitation in a balloon, and why should we not hope that ultimately he may be able to stop or accelerate his drift along the Time Dimension; or even to turn about and travel the other way?

Let your love be stronger than your hate or anger. Learn the wisdom of compromise, for it is better to bend a little than to break.