I don’t think the human mind can comprehend the past and the future. They are both just illusions that can manipulate you into thinking theres some kind of change.

Contradiction is not a sign of falsity, nor the lack of contradiction a sign of truth.

A true artist is expected to be all that is noble-minded, and this is not altogether a mistake; on the other hand, however, in what a mean way are critics allowed to pounce upon us.

The future is like heaven, everyone exalts it, but no one wants to go there now.

O wretched man, wretched not just because of what you are, but also because you do not know how wretched you are!

For centuries, theologians have been explaining the unknowable in terms of the-not-worth-knowing.

Of all the varieties of virtues, liberalism is the most beloved.

If I read a book that impresses me, I have to take myself firmly by the hand, before I mix with other people; otherwise they would think my mind rather queer.

It is sadder to find the past again and find it inadequate to the present than it is to have it elude you and remain forever a harmonious conception of memory.

Man is made to adore and to obey: but if you will not command him, if you give him nothing to worship, he will fashion his own divinities, and find a chieftain in his own passions.

Mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.

I don’t think that a leader can control, to any great extent, his destiny. Very seldom can he step in and change the situation if the forces of history are running in another direction.

He who has made a fair compact with poverty is rich.

The ultimate value of life depends upon awareness and the power of contemplation rather than upon mere survival.

States are not moral agents.

If you think only of evil, then you become pessimistic and hopeless like Freud. But if you think there is no evil, then you’re just one more deluded Pollyanna.

You can’t be in politics unless you can walk in a room and know in a minute who’s for you and who’s against you.

The boundaries which divide Life from Death are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall say where the one ends, and where the other begins?

I’m always disappointed when people don’t live up to their potential. I know that a number of people look down on themselves and consequently on everybody who looks like them. But that, too, can change.

He who can be, and therefore is, another’s, and he who participates in reason enough to apprehend, but not to have, is a slave by nature.

I change during the course of a day. I wake and I’m one person, and when I go to sleep I know for certain I’m somebody else.

God is cruel. Sometimes he makes you live.

The environment that we call society is created by past generations; we accept it, as it helps us to maintain our greed, possessiveness, illusion.

We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts, we make the world.

The age of chivalry is past. Bores have succeeded to dragons.

For one swallow does not make a summer, nor does one day; and so too one day, or a short time, does not make a man blessed and happy.

A man is a god in ruins. When men are innocent, life shall be longer, and shall pass into the immortal, as gently as we awake from dreams.

Truth is what works.

All human laws are, properly speaking, only declaratory; they have no power over the substance of original justice.

If my survival caused another to perish, then death would be sweeter and more beloved.

No one would talk much in society if they knew how often they misunderstood others.

I believe that one person can make a difference.

You know, people talk about this being an uncertain time. You know, all time is uncertain. I mean, it was uncertain back in – in 2007, we just didn’t know it was uncertain. It was – uncertain on September 10th, 2001. It was uncertain on October 18th, 1987, you just didn’t know it.

Men show their character in nothing more clearly than what they think laughable.

The man of science is a poor philosopher.

What is normal? Normal was yesterday. If you lose a leg, one day you’re hopping around on one leg, so you know the difference.

The game is changing with songs like ‚Earned It‘ as opposed to it changing me.

They’re right to think that about me, because I’m the person most likely to sleep with my female fans, I genuinely love other women. And I think they know that.

A person who is gifted sees the essential point and leaves the rest as surplus.

Most people would sooner die than think; in fact, they do so.

Death is a commingling of eternity with time; in the death of a good man, eternity is seen looking through time.

Hegel was right when he said that we learn from history that man can never learn anything from history.

Science is but an image of the truth.

Isn’t it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?

If it’s true that our species is alone in the universe, then I’d have to say the universe aimed rather low and settled for very little.

We can fear things into existence. Fear looks into the future and imagines the worst that can happen.

Certainly the best works, and of greatest merit for the public, have proceeded from the unmarried, or childless men.

Is man one of God’s blunders? Or is God one of man’s blunders?

I’m not the same man I used to be, I’m not out hell-raising, stuff like that. I am a changed man.

It is wrong always, everywhere, and for everyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence.

Ethics is in origin the art of recommending to others the sacrifices required for cooperation with oneself.

A great social success is a pretty girl who plays her cards as carefully as if she were plain.

Only a philosophy of eternity, in the world today, could justify non-violence.

To remain a credible leader, I must always work first, hardest, and longest on changing myself. This is neither easy nor natural, but it is essential.

Every man is rich or poor according to the proportion between his desires and his enjoyments.

Suppose you could gain everything in the whole world, and lost your soul. Was it worth it?

It is not when truth is dirty, but when it is shallow, that the lover of knowledge is reluctant to step into its waters.

Sleep is the interest we have to pay on the capital which is called in at death; and the higher the rate of interest and the more regularly it is paid, the further the date of redemption is postponed.

We do not learn; and what we call learning is only a process of recollection.

Those who have knowledge, don’t predict. Those who predict, don’t have knowledge.

My philosophy is that if I have any money I invest it in new ventures and not have it sitting around.