All science is the search for unity in hidden likenesses.

By the worldly standards of public life, all scholars in their work are of course oddly virtuous. They do not make wild claims, they do not cheat, they do not try to persuade at any cost, they appeal neither to prejudice nor to authority . . .

The idea that the universe is running down comes from a simple observation about machines. Every machine consumes more energy than it renders.

Satire is not a social dynamite. But it is a social indicator: it shows that new men are knocking at the door.

It's a sort of curious phenomenon that God is somehow not quite as nice as the devil; the devil doesn't punish you for behaving well, but God punishes you for behaving badly.

You will die but the carbon will not; its career does not end with you. It will return to the soil, and there a plant may take it up again in time, sending it once more on a cycle of plant and animal life.

The great poem and the deep theorem are new to every reader, and yet are his own experiences, because he himself recreates them.