Democracy is a poor system of government at best; the only thing that can honestly be said in its favor is that it is eight times as good as any other method the human race has ever tried.

From somewhere, back in my youth, heard Prof say, 'Manuel, when faced with a problem you do not understand, do any part of it you do understand, then look at it again.' He had been teaching me something he himself did not understand very well—something in math—but had taught me something far more important, a basic principle.

A little more money won't do you any good - because daughters can use up ten percent more than a man can make in any normal occupation, regardless of the amount.

I've found out why people laugh. They laugh because it hurts- because it's the only thing that'll make it stop hurting... I had been told that a 'funny' thing is a thing of goodness. It isn't... The goodness is in the laughing. I grok it is a bravery- and a sharing- against pain and sorrow and defeat.

Who is more real? Homer or Ulysses? Shakespeare or Hamlet? Burroughs or Tarzan?

There is an old, old story about a theologian who was asked to reconcile the Doctrine of Divine Mercy with the doctrine of infant damnation. 'The Almighty,' he explained, 'finds it necessary to do things in His official and public capacity which in His private and personal capacity He deplores.

All cats are not gray after midnight.