I was bold in the pursuit of knowledge, never fearing to follow truth and reason to whatever results they led, and bearding every authority which stood in their way.

The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie, deliberate, contrived and dishonest, but the myth, persistent, persuasive and unrealistic.

The courage we desire and prize is not the courage to die decently, but to live manfully.

Science investigates; religion interprets. Science gives man knowledge which is power; religion gives man wisdom which is control.

Why has government been instituted at all? Because the passions of men will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice, without constraint.

Prices are important not because money is considered paramount but because prices are a fast and effective conveyor of information through a vast society in which fragmented knowledge must be coordinated.

Laughter is one of the very privileges of reason, being confined to the human species.

There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them.

Peace if possible, truth at all costs.

No man can reveal to you nothing but that which already lies half-asleep in the dawning of your knowledge.

I began revolution with 82 men. If I had to do it again, I do it with 10 or 15 and absolute faith. It does not matter how small you are if you have faith and plan of action.

A little learning is a dangerous thing, but we must take that risk because a little is as much as our biggest heads can hold.

Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.

To the press alone, chequered as it is with abuses, the world is indebted for all the triumphs which have been gained by reason and humanity over error and oppression.

Although nature commences with reason and ends in experience it is necessary for us to do the opposite, that is to commence with experience and from this to proceed to investigate the reason.

Women have to be active listeners and interrupters – but when you interrupt, you have to know what you are talking about.

All credibility, all good conscience, all evidence of truth come only from the senses.

The first quality that is needed is audacity.

A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on.

The proper study of mankind is books.

The essence of lying is in deception, not in words.

Memory is the treasury and guardian of all things.

It takes a lot of courage to show your dreams to someone else.

Courage is knowing what not to fear.

Virtue is bold, and goodness never fearful.

Courage is found in unlikely places.

It takes a wise man to discover a wise man.

Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.

Force does not constitute right… obedience is due only to legitimate powers.

Nature is the source of all true knowledge. She has her own logic, her own laws, she has no effect without cause nor invention without necessity.

To be ignorant of what occurred before you were born is to remain always a child.

Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened.

If you can’t read, the only thing you can do is enjoy the pictures, not the whole story. Reading is the key to knowledge. Knowledge is the key to understanding. So read on, young man! Read on, young lady!

The future doesn’t belong to the fainthearted; it belongs to the brave.

Cowardice asks the question, is it safe? Expediency asks the question, is it politic? Vanity asks the question, is it popular? But conscience asks the question, is it right? And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but one must take it because it is right.

For the bureaucrat, the world is a mere object to be manipulated by him.

Nothing fortifies scepticism more than the fact that there are some who are not sceptics; if all were so, they would be wrong.

A lot of people ask me when I do a stunt, ‚Jackie, are you scared?‘ Of course I’m scared. I’m not Superman.

Frankly, I think that the news industry is critically important because it points out things and surfaces truths that can often be uncomfortable. I think that that’s working, and the spotlight has been pointed on things that we have a responsibility to do better, and I accept that.

Daring to set boundaries is about having the courage to love ourselves, even when we risk disappointing others.

Courage, above all things, is the first quality of a warrior.

There is much pleasure to be gained from useless knowledge.

The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.

Speak the truth, and all things alive or brute are vouchers, and the very roots of the grass underground there, do seem to stir and move to bear you witness.

It is paradoxical, yet true, to say, that the more we know, the more ignorant we become in the absolute sense, for it is only through enlightenment that we become conscious of our limitations. Precisely one of the most gratifying results of intellectual evolution is the continuous opening up of new and greater prospects.

The valiant never taste of death but once.

Remember that the essence of authority is that people willingly follow your lead.

Truth is the property of no individual but is the treasure of all men.

There are a lot of ‚chicken Christians.‘ Chickens are generally afraid of life, and they seldom fly or reach their potential in life. And when a storm comes, all they seem to do is flap around the chicken yard, stirring up dirt and running to the chicken house.

Piety requires us to honor truth above our friends.

The thing that I fear discriminating against is humor and truth.

A taste for truth at any cost is a passion which spares nothing.

There are only the pursued, the pursuing, the busy and the tired.

The coward only threatens when he is safe.

As long as the people don’t fear the truth, there is hope. For once they fear it, the one who tells it doesn’t stand a chance. And today, truth is still beautiful… but so frightening.

Imagination is a poor matter when it has to part company with understanding.

Doubt is the incentive to truth and inquiry leads the way.

I left the woods for as good a reason as I went there. Perhaps it seemed to me that I had several more lives to live and could not spare any more time for that one.

More people should read books. It’s the most concentrated experience you can have.

Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful.

Power over a man’s subsistence is power over his will.