I may not be better than other people, but at least I'm different.

One's only rival is one's own potentialities. One's only failure is failing to live up to one's own possibilities. In this sense, every man can be a king, and must therefore be treated like a king.

New opinions are always suspected, and usually opposed, without any other reason but because they are not common.

I just want to retire before I go senile because if I don't retire before I go senile, then I'll do more damage than good at that point.

Trying to define yourself is like trying to bite your own teeth.

Rich men's houses are seldom beautiful, rarely comfortable, and never original. It is a constant source of surprise to people of moderate means to observe how little a big fortune contributes to Beauty.

One must judge men not by their opinions, but by what their opinions have made of them.

The imagination is not a state: it is the human existence itself.

Reputation is what men and women think of us; character is what God and angels know of us.

No snowflake in an avalanche ever feels responsible.

Comedy is acting out optimism.

All that spirits desire, spirits attain.

Words have no power to impress the mind without the exquisite horror of their reality.

All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.

What's with you men? Would hair stop growing on your chest if you asked directions somewhere?

The hardest thing to explain is the glaringly evident which everybody has decided not to see.

Be less curious about people and more curious about ideas.

I don't try to imagine a personal god; it suffices to stand in awe at the structure of the world, insofar as it allows our inadequate senses to appreciate it.

I am not ashamed to confess that I am ignorant of what I do not know.

To be rooted is perhaps the most important and least recognized need of the human soul.

I must uphold my ideals, for perhaps the time will come when I shall be able to carry them out.