The ability to retain a child's view of the world with at the same time a mature understanding of what it means to retain it, is extremely rare - and a person who has these qualities is likely to be able to contribute something really important to our thinking.

There is no more irritating fellow than the man who tries to settle an argument about communism, or justice, or liberty, by quoting from Webster.

One of the aims of sexual union is procreation - the creation by reproduction of an image of itself, of the union.

A good book deserves an active reading. The activity of reading does not stop with the work of understanding what a book says. It must be completed by the work of criticism, the work of judging. The undemanding reader fails to satisfy this requirement, probably even more than he fails to analyze and interpret. He not only makes no effort to understand; he also dismisses a book simply by putting it aside and forgetting it. Worse than faintly praising it, he damns it by giving it no critical consideration whatever.

Angels are able to know and understand better than the human intellect can, precisely because such knowledge and understanding comes to them by way of ideas infused in them by God.

The dictionary also invites a playful reading. It challenges anyone to sit down with it in an idle moment. There are worse ways to kill time.

Philosophy is everybody's business.