Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Logical consequences are the scarecrows of fools and the beacons of wise men.
It is far better for a man to go wrong in freedom than to go right in chains.
That mysterious independent variable of political calculation, Public Opinion.
Proclaim human equality as loudly as you like, Witless will serve his brother.
There is the greatest practical benefit in making a few failures early in life.
In scientific work, those who refuse to go beyond fact rarely get as far as fact.
Life is too short to occupy oneself with the slaying of the slain more than once.
Science has fulfilled her function when she has ascertained and enunciated truth.
What men of science want is only a fair day's wages for more than a fair day's work.
To a clear eye the smallest fact is a window through which the infinite may be seen.
The scientific imagination always restrains itself within the limits of probability.
The great tragedy of science - the slaying of a beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact.
We are prone to see what lies behind our eyes, rather than what apprears before them.
Follow humbly wherever and to whatever abyss Nature leads, or you shall learn nothing.
I would rather be the offspring of two apes than be a man and afraid to face the truth.
There are savages without God in any proper sense of the word, but none without ghosts.
The only people, scientific or other, who never make mistakes are those who do nothing.
I took thought, and invented what I conceived to be the appropriate title of 'agnostic'.
It is the customary fate of new truths, to begin as heresies, and to end as superstitions.
Every great advance in natural knowledge has involved the absolute rejection of authority.
Science is organized common sense where many a beautiful theory was killed by an ugly fact.
Surely there is a time to submit to guidance and a time to take one's own way at all hazards.
There is no sadder sight in the world than to see a beautiful theory killed by a brutal fact.
The man of science has learned to believe in justification, not by faith, but by verification.
People may talk about intellectual teaching, but what we principally want is the moral teaching.
The great thing in the world is not so much to seek happiness as to earn peace and self-respect.
Teach a man to read and write, and you have put into his hands the great keys of the wisdom-box.
Though under-instruction is a bad thing, it is not impossible that over-instruction may be worse.
The results of political changes are hardly ever those which their friends hope or their foes fear.
Teach a child what is wise, that is morality. Teach him what is wise and beautiful, that is religion!
Matter and force are the two names of the one artist who fashions the living as well as the lifeless.
No one can help another very much in these crises of life; but love and sympathy count for something.
Fact I know; and Law I know; but what is this Necessity, save an empty shadow of my own mind's throwing?
There is no absurdity in theology so great that you cannot parallel it by a greater absurdity in Nature.
The best men of the best epochs are simply those who make the fewest blunders and commit the fewest sins.
Freedom and order are not incompatible... truth is strength... free discussion is the very life of truth.
Extinguished theologians lie about the cradle of every science, as strangled snakes beside that of Hercules
If a man cannot see a church, it is preposterous to take his opinion about its altar-piece or painted window.
Better live a crossing-sweeper than die and be made to talk twaddle by a "medium" hired at a guinea a seance.
History warns us that it is the customary fate of new truths to begin as heresies and to end as superstitions.
Make up your mind to act decidedly and take the consequences. No good is ever done in this world by hesitation.
There is no greater mistake than the hasty conclusion that opinions are worthless because they are badly argued.
Only one absolute certainty is possible to man, namely that at any given moment the feeling which he has exists.
Whatever evil voices may rage, Science, secure among the powers that are eternal, will do her work and be blessed.
Mathematics may be compared to a mill of exquisite workmanship, which grinds your stuff to any degree of fineness.
The man who is all morality and intellect, although he may be good and even great, is, after all, only half a man.
The world is neither wise nor just, but it makes up for all its folly and injustice by being damnably sentimental.
The dogma of the infallibility of the Bible is no more self-evident than is that of the infallibility of the popes.
In matters of intellect, follow your reason as far as it will take you, without regard for any other consideration.
If individuality has no play, society does not advance; if individuality breaks out of all bounds, society perishes.