The only difference between the saint and the sinner is that every saint has a past, and every sinner has a future.

Wisdom has its root in goodness, not goodness its root in wisdom.

Where the Mind is biggest, the Heart, the Senses, Magnanimity, Charity, Tolerance, Kindliness, and the rest of them scarcely have room to breathe.

If I think more about death than some other people, it is probably because I love life more than they do.

My philosophy in life is, Decide what you want to do. You have to have something to hope for.

The natural desire of good men is knowledge.

In my opinion, there is no aspect of reality beyond the reach of the human mind.

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

I haven’t had that one great love, which is good. I don’t want that to be in the past – I want it to be in the future.

For as the eyes of bats are to the blaze of day, so is the reason in our soul to the things which are by nature most evident of all.

Nothing that was worthy in the past departs; no truth or goodness realized by man ever dies, or can die.

Society exists only as a mental concept; in the real world there are only individuals.

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

There is nothing good or evil save in the will.

There is a real danger that computers will develop intelligence and take over. We urgently need to develop direct connections to the brain so that computers can add to human intelligence rather than be in opposition.

We must accept what science tells us, that man was born from the earth. But, more logical than the scientists who lecture us, we must carry this lesson to its conclusion: that is to say, accept that man was born entirely from the world – not only his flesh and bones but his incredible power of thought.

Habit is a second nature that destroys the first. But what is nature? Why is habit not natural? I am very much afraid that nature itself is only a first habit, just as habit is a second nature.

Basically, at the very bottom of life, which seduces us all, there is only absurdity, and more absurdity. And maybe that’s what gives us our joy for living, because the only thing that can defeat absurdity is lucidity.

What is true of the individual will be tomorrow true of the whole nation if individuals will but refuse to lose heart and hope.

Nature abhors annihilation.

What we need is a system of thought – you might even call it a religion – that can bind humans together. A system that would fit the Republic of Chad as well as the United States: a system that would supply our idealistic young people with something to believe in.

Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.

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 have finally decided to write my book on the spiritual life. I mean to put down as simply as possible the sort of ascetical or mystical teaching that I have been living and preaching so long. I call it ‚Le Milieu Divin,‘ but I am being careful to include nothing esoteric and the minimum of explicit philosophy.

Life and death are one thread, the same line viewed from different sides.

Pessimism is a luxury that a Jew can never allow himself.

When you look into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you.

It’s really easy to have a nice philosophy about openness, but moving the world in that direction is a different thing. It requires both understanding where you want to go and being pragmatic about getting there.

Beauty itself is but the sensible image of the Infinite.

We are to admit no more causes of natural things than such as are both true and sufficient to explain their appearances.

As I approve of a youth that has something of the old man in him, so I am no less pleased with an old man that has something of the youth. He that follows this rule may be old in body, but can never be so in mind.

The future is something which everyone reaches at the rate of 60 minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is.

Wisdom allows nothing to be good that will not be so forever; no man to be happy but he that needs no other happiness than what he has within himself; no man to be great or powerful that is not master of himself.

Heaven is long-enduring, and earth continues long. The reason why heaven and earth are able to endure and continue thus long is because they do not live of, or for, themselves.

The only definition by which America’s best days are behind it is on a purely relative basis.

It is incomprehensible that God should exist, and it is incomprehensible that he should not exist.

Think occasionally of the suffering of which you spare yourself the sight.

Since God created the world, He also created reality.

I am not going to Heaven because I have preached to great crowds or read the Bible many times. I’m going to Heaven just like the thief on the cross who said in that last moment: ‚Lord, remember me.‘

Truth has no special time of its own. Its hour is now – always.

If you understand the universe, you control it, in a way.

One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.

Death does not concern us, because as long as we exist, death is not here. And when it does come, we no longer exist.

People will visit Mars, they will settle mars, and we should because it’s cool.

It’s possible – you can never know – that the universe exists only for me. If so, it’s sure going well for me, I must admit.

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.

I mean we all need a second chance sometimes.

O God, O God, how weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable seem to me all the uses of this world!

If co-operation is a duty, I hold that non-co-operation also under certain conditions is equally a duty.

Everything that exists is in a manner the seed of that which will be.

Every man is more than just himself; he also represents the unique, the very special and always significant and remarkable point at which the world’s phenomena intersect, only once in this way, and never again.

Now I will say this to every sinner, though he should think himself to be the worst sinner who ever lived: cry to the Lord and seek Him while He may be found. A throne of grace is a place fitted for you. By simple faith, go to your Savior, for He is the throne of grace.

I had faith in Israel before it was established, I have in it now. I believe it has a glorious future before it – not just another sovereign nation, but as an embodiment of the great ideals of our civilization.

Premature certainty is the enemy of the truth.

Whether if soul did not exist time would exist or not, is a question that may fairly be asked; for if there cannot be someone to count there cannot be anything that can be counted, so that evidently there cannot be number; for number is either what has been, or what can be, counted.

Faith consists in believing when it is beyond the power of reason to believe.

I think we have a duty to maintain the light of consciousness to make sure it continues into the future.

Then not only custom, but also nature affirms that to do is more disgraceful than to suffer injustice, and that justice is equality.

I have wondered about time all my life.

The fool wonders, the wise man asks.

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.