Scientist

A book is a mirror: if an ape looks into it an apostle is hardly likely to look out.

When an acquaintance goes by I often step back from my window, not so much to spare him the effort of acknowledging me as to spare myself the embarrassment of seeing that he has not done so.

To do the opposite of something is also a form of imitation, namely an imitation of its opposite.

If you are going to build something in the air it is always better to build castles than houses of cards.

The sure conviction that we could if we wanted to is the reason so many good minds are idle.

Perhaps in time the so-called Dark Ages will be thought of as including our own.

It is almost everywhere the case that soon after it is begotten the greater part of human wisdom is laid to rest in repositories.

One might call habit a moral friction: something that prevents the mind from gliding over things but connects it with them and makes it hard for it to free itself from them.

To err is human also in so far as animals seldom or never err, or at least only the cleverest of them do so.

Nowadays three witty turns of phrase and a lie make a writer.

That man is the noblest creature may also be inferred from the fact that no other creature has yet contested this claim.

Nothing is more conducive to peace of mind than not having any opinion at all.

The Greeks possessed a knowledge of human nature we seem hardly able to attain to without passing through the strengthening hibernation of a new barbarism.

One must judge men not by their opinions, but by what their opinions have made of them.

With prophecies the commentator is often a more important man than the prophet.

The American who first discovered Columbus made a bad discovery.

God created man in His own image, says the Bible; philosophers reverse the process: they create God in theirs.

Virtue by premeditation isn't worth much.

Nothing is more conducive to peace of mind than not having any opinion at all.

One might call habit a moral friction: something that prevents the mind from gliding over things but connects it with them and makes it hard for it to free itself from them.