An adequate share of humor and laughter represents an essential part of the diet of the healthy person.

The library is not a shrine for the worship of books. It is not a temple where literary incense must be burned or where one's one devotion to the bound book is expressed in ritual. A library, to modify the famous metaphor of Socrates, should be the delivery room for the birth of ideas - a place where history comes to life.

At a Dodger baseball game in Los Angeles, I asked Will Durant if he was ninety-four or ninety-five. "Ninety-four," he said. "You don't think I'd be doing anything as foolish as this if I were ninety-five, do you?"

Respect for the fragility and importance of an individual life is still the mark of an educated man.

Infinity converts the possible into the inevitable.

Never deny a diagnosis, but do deny the negative verdict that may go with it.

Unobstructed access to facts can produce unlimited good only if it is matched by the desire and ability to find out what they mean and where they lead.