Quotations
“I do not speak the minds of others except to speak my own mind better.”
— Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592)
Bureaucracy is a parasite that preys on free thought and suffocates free spirit.
The difference between something that can go wrong and something that can't possibly go wrong is that when something that can't possibly go wrong goes wrong it usually turns out to be impossible to get at or repair.
It is not of the essence of mathematics to be occupied with the ideas of number and quantity.
In re mathematica ars proponendi pluris facienda est quam solvendi.
In mathematics the art of asking [questions] is more valuable than solving.
Of the many imprisonments possible in our world, one of the worst must be to be inarticulate — to be unable to tell another person what you really feel.
I like the silent church before the service begins, better than any preaching.
A friend is a person with whom I may be sincere. Before him I may think aloud.
Parting with friends is a sadness. A place is only a place.
When law and duty are one, united by religion, you never become fully conscious, fully aware of yourself. You are always a little less than an individual.
The uncreative mind can spot wrong answers, but it takes a very creative mind to spot wrong questions.
I would rather be ashes than dust! I would rather that my spark should burn out in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dry-rot. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet. The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.
Je ne dis les autres, sinon pour d'autant plus me dire.
I do not speak the minds of others except to speak my own mind better.
Il n'est si homme de bien, qu'il mette à l'examen des loix toutes ses actions et pensées, qui ne soit pendable dix fois en sa vie.
There is no man so good that if he placed all his actions and thoughts under the scrutiny of the laws, he would not deserve hanging ten times in his life.
Si, avons nous beau monter sur des échasses, car sur des échasses encore faut-il marcher de nos jambes. Et au plus élevé trône du monde, si ne sommes assis que sur notre cul.
No matter that we may mount on stilts, we still must walk on our own legs. And on the highest throne in the world, we still sit only on our own ass.
Les Roys et les philosophes fientent, et les dames aussi.
Kings and philosophers shit; and so do ladies.
Wer mit Ungeheuern kämpft, mag zusehn, dass er nicht dabei zum Ungeheuer wird. Und wenn du lange in einen Abgrund blickst, blickt der Abgrund auch in dich hinein.
He who fights with monsters should take care that he himself does not thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss also gazes into you.
Was mich nicht umbringt, macht mich stärker.
What does not destroy me, makes me stronger.
God does not play dice with the universe; He plays an ineffable game of His own devising, which might be compared, from the perspective of any of the other players [i.e., everybody], to being involved in an obscure and complex version of poker in a pitch-dark room, with blank cards, for infinite stakes, with a Dealer who won't tell you the rules, and who smiles all the time.
Il semble que la perfection soit atteinte non quand il n'y a plus rien à ajouter, mais quand il n'y a plus rien à retrancher.
It seems that perfection is attained not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing more to remove.
Since, in the long run, every planetary society will be endangered by impacts from space, every surviving civilization is obliged to become spacefaring — not because of exploratory or romantic zeal, but for the most practical reason imaginable: staying alive.
We live in a society absolutely dependent on science and technology and yet have cleverly arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. That's a clear prescription for disaster.
When we realize that an educated Japanese can hardly frame a single literary sentence without the use of Chinese resources, that to this day Siamese and Burmese and Cambodgian bear the unmistakable imprint of the Sanskrit and Pali that came in with Hindu Buddhism centuries ago, or that whether we argue for or against the teaching of Latin and Greek our argument is sure to be studded with words that have come to us from Rome and Athens, we get some inkling of what early Chinese culture and Buddhism and classical Mediterranean civilization have meant in the world's history. There are just five languages that have had an overwhelming significance as carriers of culture. They are classical Chinese, Sanskrit, Arabic, Greek, and Latin. In comparison with these even such culturally important languages as Hebrew and French sink into a secondary position.
[E]rrant consilia nostra, quia non habent quo derigantur; ignoranti quem portum petat nullus suus ventus est. Necesse est multum in vita nostra casus possit, quia vivimus casu. Quibusdam autem evenit ut quaedam scire se nesciant; quemadmodum quaerimus saepe eos cum quibus stamus, ita plerumque finem summi boni ignoramus appositum.
Our plans miscarry because they have no aim. When a man does not know what harbour he is making for, no wind is the right wind. Chance must necessarily have great influence over our lives, because we live by chance. It is the case with certain men, however, that they do not know that they know certain things. Just as we often seek those by whom we stand, so we are apt to forget that the goal of the Supreme Good lies near us.
Then a great beauty was revealed in him, so that all who after came there looked on him with wonder; for they saw the grace of his youth, and the valor of his manhood, and the wisdom and majesty of his age were all blended together. And long there he lay, an image of the splendour of the Kings of Men in glory undimmed before the breaking of the world.