Everything is possible for an eccentric, especially when he is English.

From the moment they had left the Earth, their own weight, and that of the Projectile and the objects therein contained, had been undergoing a progressive diminution. . . . Of course, it is quite clear, that this decrease could not be indicated by an ordinary scales, as the weight to balance the object would have lost precisely as much as the object itself. But a spring balance, for instance, in which the tension of the coil is independent of attraction, would have readily given the exact equivalent of the loss.

Science, my lad, has been built upon many errors; but they are errors which it was good to fall into, for they led to the truth.

The Nautilus was piercing the water with its sharp spur, after having accomplished nearly ten thousand leagues in three months and a half, a distance greater than the great circle of the earth. Where were we going now, and what was reserved for the future?

How many things have been denied one day, only to become realities the next!

The chance which now seems lost may present itself at the last moment.

[we see that] science is eminently perfectible, and that each theory has constantly to give way to a fresh one.