It was equally imperative that this chain of reactions should always tend to dampen, to die out. It must not build up, or the uranium mass would explode within a time interval too short to be measured by any means whatsoever. Nor would there be anyone left to measure it.

An armed man need not fight.

The price of freedom is the willingness to do sudden battle anywhere, any time and with utter recklessness.

For me, politeness is a sine qua non of civilization.

Art is the process of evoking pity and terror, which is not abstract at all but very human. What the self-styled modern artists are doing is a sort of unemotional pseudointellectual masturbation . . . whereas creative art is more like intercourse, in which the artist must seduce -- render emotional -- his audience, each time.

Once you get to earth orbit, you're halfway to anywhere in the solar system.

Every law that was ever written opened up a new way to graft.