Who ever heard, indeed, of an autobiography that was not (interesting)? I can recall none in all the literature of the world

Fame: an embalmer trembling with stage fright.

But I wonder where we will land if trial judges begin deciding that the fact that a man has committed an atrocious crime is proof sufficient that he is not responsible for his acts.

The aim of public education is not to spread enlightenment at all; it is simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same safe level, to breed a standard citizenry, to put down dissent and originality.

The sort of man who likes to spend his time watching a cage of monkeys chase one another, or a lion gnaw its tail, or a lizard catch flies, is precisely the sort of man whose mental weakness should be combated at the public expense, not fostered.

The learned are seldom pretty fellows, and in many cases their appearance tends to discourage a love of study in the young.

The notion that science does not concern itself with first causes - that it leaves the field to theology or metaphysics, and confines itself to mere effects - this notion has no support in the plain facts. If it could, science would explain the origin of life on earth at once - and there is every reason to believe that it will do so on some not too remote tomorrow. To argue that gaps in knowledge which will confront the seeker must be filled, not by patient inquiry, but by intuition or revelation, is simply to give ignorance a gratuitous and preposterous dignity.