It does not matter how many tumbles you have in this life, so long as you do not get dirty when you tumble; it is only the people who have to stop to be washed and made clean, who must necessarily lose the race. And I can assure you that there is the greatest practical benefit in making a few failures early in life. You learn that which is of inestimable importance

I doubt the fact, to begin with, but if it be so even, what is this but in grand words asking me to believe a thing because I like it.

It sounds paradoxical to say the attainment of scientific truth has been effected, to a great extent, by the help of scientific errors.

I have never been able to understand why pigeon-shooting at Hurlingham should be refined and polite, while a rat-killing match in Whitechapel is low.

I have no faith, very little hope, and as much charity as I can afford.

If the twentieth century is to be better than the nineteenth, it will be because there are among us men who walk in Priestley's footsteps....To all eternity, the sum of truth and right will have been increased by their means; to all eternity, falsehoods and injustice will be the weaker because they have lived.

If a man cannot see a church, it is preposterous to take his opinion about its altar-piece or painted window.