No man enjoys the true taste of life, but he who is ready and willing to quit it.

Experience without theory is blind, but theory without experience is mere intellectual play.

Small is the number of people who see with their eyes and think with their minds.

A man may die, nations may rise and fall, but an idea lives on.

If a man or woman is born ten years sooner or later, their whole aspect and performance shall be different.

We often want one thing and pray for another, not telling the truth even to the gods.

My goal is simple. It is a complete understanding of the universe, why it is as it is and why it exists at all.

My life is not unlike Truman’s. I can’t go anywhere.

Nature cannot be tricked or cheated. She will give up to you the object of your struggles only after you have paid her price.

For this generation, ours, life is nuclear survival, liberty is human rights, the pursuit of happiness is a planet whose resources are devoted to the physical and spiritual nourishment of its inhabitants.

I am a deeply religious nonbeliever – this is a somewhat new kind of religion.

You cannot step into the same river twice.

Peace is liberty in tranquillity.

Nothing has been purchased more dearly than the little bit of reason and sense of freedom which now constitutes our pride.

You have a ready wit. Tell me when it’s ready.

Enjoyment is an incredible energizer to the human spirit.

Man is an intelligence in servitude to his organs.

Science has not yet taught us if madness is or is not the sublimity of the intelligence.

We should not say that one man’s hour is worth another man’s hour, but rather that one man during an hour is worth just as much as another man during an hour. Time is everything, man is nothing: he is at the most time’s carcass.

Real life? Well, I just hope mine isn’t investigated. They might find that I don’t really exist – that I’m just a hologram.

All that seems indispensible in stating the account between the dead and the living, is to see that the debts against the latter do not exceed the advances made by the former.

What sweetness is left in life, if you take away friendship? Robbing life of friendship is like robbing the world of the sun. A true friend is more to be esteemed than kinsfolk.

The moral arc of the universe bends at the elbow of justice.

The book, ’12 Rules For Life,‘ is a very serious book. There’s elements of humor in it, but I’m trying to struggle with things at the deepest possible level and to explain to people why it’s necessary to live a upstanding and noble and moral and truthful and responsible life, and why there’s hell to pay if you don’t do that.

Do not impose on others what you yourself do not desire.

The universe is not required to be in perfect harmony with human ambition.

When it comes to life the critical thing is whether you take things for granted or take them with gratitude.

We are not living in a world where all roads are radii of a circle and where all, if followed long enough, will therefore draw gradually nearer and finally meet at the centre: rather in a world where every road, after a few miles, forks into two, and each of those into two again, and at each fork, you must make a decision.

The universe is not indifferent to our existence – it depends on it.

Singleness of purpose is one of the chief essentials for success in life, no matter what may be one’s aim.

We moralize among ruins.

Is it not enough to know the evil to shun it? If not, we should be sincere enough to admit that we love evil too well to give it up.

We do not know what love is. We know the symptoms of it, the pleasure, the pain, the fear, the anxiety and so on. We try to solve the symptoms, which becomes a wandering in darkness. We spend our days and nights in this, and it is soon over in death.

The false is nothing but an imitation of the true.

He who is not just is severe, he who is not wise is sad.

A man is born alone and dies alone; and he experiences the good and bad consequences of his karma alone; and he goes alone to hell or the Supreme abode.

Our character is not so much the product of race and heredity as of those circumstances by which nature forms our habits, by which we are nurtured and live.

Create a ladder of values and priorities in your life, reminding yourself of what really matters to you.

None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.

Shall I tell you what the real evil is? To cringe to the things that are called evils, to surrender to them our freedom, in defiance of which we ought to face any suffering.

This is the truth: as from a fire aflame thousands of sparks come forth, even so from the Creator an infinity of beings have life and to him return again.

It seems the older you get, the more life comes into focus.

Such is the feebleness of humanity, such is its perversity, that doubtless it is better for it to be subject to all possible superstitions, as long as they are not murderous, than to live without religion.

Without health life is not life; it is only a state of langour and suffering – an image of death.

A jug fills drop by drop.

There is no love of life without despair of life.

Man never thinks himself happy, but when he enjoys those things which others want or desire.

There are three constants in life… change, choice and principles.

We must be willing to pay a price for freedom.

Faith: not wanting to know what is true.

If you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans.

As soon as questions of will or decision or reason or choice of action arise, human science is at a loss.

May be is very well, but Must is the master. It is my duty to show justice without recompense.

I got my buzz from playing.

Nothing is enough for the man to whom enough is too little.

Are creeds such simple things like the clothes which a man can change at will and put on at will? Creeds are such for which people live for ages and ages.

Use, do not abuse… neither abstinence nor excess ever renders man happy.

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

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

All who think cannot but see there is a sanction like that of religion which binds us in partnership in the serious work of the world.

Life isn’t about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.