For the educated, the authority of science rested on the strictness of its methods; for the mass, it rested on the powers of explanation.

Education in the United States is a passion and a paradox. Millions want it, and commend it, and are busy about it. At the same time they degrade it by trying to get it free of charge and free of work.

Simple English is no one’s mother tongue. It has to be worked for.

The sole justification of teaching, of the school itself, is that the student comes out of it able to do something he could not do before. I say do and not know, because knowledge that doesn't lead to doing something new or doing something better is not knowledge at all.

It is always some illusion that creates disillusion, especially in the young, for whom the only alternative to perfection is cynicism.

One great aim of revision is to cut out. In the exuberance of composition it is natural to throw in - as one does in speaking - a number of small words that add nothing to meaning but keep up the flow and rhythm of thought. In writing, not only does this surplusage not add to meaning, it subtracts from it. Read and revise, reread and revise, keeping reading and revising until your text seems adequate to your thought.

An artist has every right - one may even say a duty - to exhibit his productions as prominently as he can.