When people talk of atoms obeying fixed laws, they are either ascribing some kind of intelligence and free will to atoms or they are talking nonsense. There is no obedience unless there is at any rate a potentiality of disobeying.

An obstinate man does not hold opinions, but they hold him; for when he is once possessed with an error, it is, like a devil, only cast out with great difficulty.

A definition is the enclosing a wilderness of idea within a wall of words.

If a man knows not life which he hath seen, how shall he know death, which he hath not seen?

There is no permanent absolute unchangeable truth; what we should pursue is the most convenient arrangement of our ideas.

When the water of a place is bad it is safest to drink none that has not been filtered through either the berry of a grape, or else a tub of malt. These are the most reliable filters yet invented.

Men of Science. If they are worthy of the name they are indeed about God's path and about his bed and spying out all his ways.