We’re all of us guinea pigs in the laboratory of God. Humanity is just a work in progress.

If I make music and people hate it, you know, whatever. I’ll die someday, and one day, they will too.

If God listened to the prayers of men, all men would quickly have perished: for they are forever praying for evil against one another.

If you’ve spent a long time developing a skill and techniques, and now some 14 year-old upstart can get exactly the same result, you might feel a bit miffed I suppose, but that has happened forever.

If only God would give me some clear sign! Like making a large deposit in my name at a Swiss bank.

He who loves practice without theory is like the sailor who boards ship without a rudder and compass and never knows where he may cast.

Not to go back is somewhat to advance, and men must walk, at least, before they dance.

Conservatism discards Prescription, shrinks from Principle, disavows Progress; having rejected all respect for antiquity, it offers no redress for the present, and makes no preparation for the future.

No; we have been as usual asking the wrong question. It does not matter a hoot what the mockingbird on the chimney is singing. The real and proper question is: Why is it beautiful?

Those who do not know how to live must make a merit of dying.

You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you mad.

There will always be something to ruin our lives, it all depends on what or which finds us first. We are always ripe and ready to be taken.

The important achievement of Apollo was demonstrating that humanity is not forever chained to this planet and our visions go rather further than that and our opportunities are unlimited.

And while the law of competition may be sometimes hard for the individual, it is best for the race, because it ensures the survival of the fittest in every department.

Why are we here? Where do we come from? Traditionally, these are questions for philosophy, but philosophy is dead.

Sometimes what works 40 years ago doesn’t work today.

Do not keep saying to yourself, if you can possibly avoid it, ‚But how can it be like that?‘ because you will get ‚down the drain,‘ into a blind alley from which nobody has yet escaped. Nobody knows how it can be like that.

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.

Time stays, we go.

A well governed appetite is the greater part of liberty.

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

But just as they did in Philadelphia when they were writing the constitution, sooner or later, you’ve got to compromise. You’ve got to start making the compromises that arrive at a consensus and move the country forward.

Creation is a miracle of daily recurrence. ‚A miracle a minute‘ would not be a bad slogan for God.

God may be subtle, but he isn’t plain mean.

It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop.

There’s always an element of self delusion among people who believe they ought to be President. There’s an underestimation of your opponent and an overestimation of your own abilities. This is compatible with being rich and powerful, the idea that we were blessed by God because we deserve to be blessed.

All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players: they have their exits and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts, his acts being seven ages.

Searching for music is like searching for God. They’re very similar. There’s an effort to reclaim the unmentionable, the unsayable, the unseeable, the unspeakable, all those things, comes into being a composer and to writing music and to searching for notes and pieces of musical information that don’t exist.

The existentialist says at once that man is anguish.

Humanity I love you because when you’re hard up you pawn your intelligence to buy a drink.

Not only does God play dice, but… he sometimes throws them where they cannot be seen.

God in the beginning formed matter in solid, massy, hard, impenetrable, movable particles, of such sizes and figures, and with such other properties, and in such proportion to space, as most conduced to the end for which he formed them.

Freedom without limits is just a word.

If there really is a god, then he really looks after me.

I am at peace with God. My conflict is with Man.

Words are loaded pistols.

These poems, with all their crudities, doubts, and confusions, are written for the love of Man and in praise of God, and I’d be a damn‘ fool if they weren’t.

Philosophers have not kept up with modern developments in science. Particularly physics.

There is nothing besides a spiritual world; what we call the world of the senses is the Evil in the spiritual world, and what we call Evil is only the necessity of a moment in our eternal evolution.

Personal success or personal satisfaction are not worth another thought if one does achieve them, or worth worrying about if they evade one or are slow in coming. All that is really worth while is action – faithful action, for the world, and in God.

God never meant that people were to wear clothes. He meant we were to be nude. But we were in a state of innocence. Then sin came into the human race and became a blood poisoning.

Chance is a word void of sense; nothing can exist without a cause.

Men would be angels, angels would be gods.

If there was an observer on Mars, they would probably be amazed that we have survived this long.

Nothing cannot exist forever.

It is not possible for civilization to flow backwards while there is youth in the world. Youth may be headstrong, but it will advance it allotted length.

I do not know how to teach philosophy without becoming a disturber of established religion.

Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness.

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

To bear means to support the weight of that which is held. It is a sacred trust to bear the priesthood, which is the mighty power and authority of God.

How can one preach goodness and love to men without at the same time offering them an interpretation of the World that justifies this goodness and this love?

Man is an intelligence in servitude to his organs.

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

Religion is not a department of life; it is something that enters into the whole of it.

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

Remember, it is not about voting for the perfect candidate – there is no such thing. Presidents are human.

Concede that the new government of Louisiana is only to what it should be, as the egg is to the fowl; we shall sooner have the fowl by hatching the egg than by smashing it.

The earth belongs to the living, not to the dead.

There are only two things. Truth and lies. Truth is indivisible, hence it cannot recognize itself; anyone who wants to recognize it has to be a lie.

I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that his justice cannot sleep forever.

Whoever thinks a faultless piece to see, Thinks what ne’er was, nor is, nor e’er shall be.