A god who is both self-sufficient and content to remain so could not interest us enough to raise the question of his existence.

When I am in the company of scientists, I feel like a shabby curate who has strayed by mistake into a drawing room full of dukes.

It is, for example, axiomatic that we should all think of ourselves as being more sensitive than other people because, when we are insensitive in our dealings with others, we cannot be aware of it at the time: conscious insensitivity is a self-contradiction.

History is, strictly speaking, the study of questions; the study of answers belongs to anthropology and sociology.

Genealogies are admirable things, provided they do not encourage the curious delusion that some families are older than others.

The ear tends to be lazy, craves the familiar and is shocked by the unexpected; the eye, on the other hand, tends to be impatient, craves the novel and is bored by repetition.

The only reason the Protestants and Catholics have given up the idea of universal domination is because they've realised they can't get away with it.