You've got to watch your mind all the time or you'll awaken and find a strange picture on your press.

You've got to watch your mind all the time or you'll awaken and find a strange picture on your press.

Every man is as Heaven made him, and sometimes a great deal worse.

Every man is as Heaven made him, and sometimes a great deal worse.

What monstrosities would walk the streets were some people's faces as unfinished as their minds.

What monstrosities would walk the streets were some people's faces as unfinished as their minds.

It is the acquisition of skills in particular, irrespective of their utility, that is potent in making life meaningful. Since read more

It is the acquisition of skills in particular, irrespective of their utility, that is potent in making life meaningful. Since man has no inborn skills, the survival of the species has depended on the ability to acquire and perfect skills. Hence the mastery of skills is a uniquely human activity and yields deep satisfaction.

Being intelligent is not a felony. But most societies evaluate it as at least a misdemeanor.

Being intelligent is not a felony. But most societies evaluate it as at least a misdemeanor.

It seems that when we are oppressed by the knowledge of our worthlessness we do not see ourselves as lower read more

It seems that when we are oppressed by the knowledge of our worthlessness we do not see ourselves as lower than some and higher than others, but as lower than the lowest of mankind. We hate then the whole world, and we would pour our wrath upon the whole of creation.

Ignorance and superstition ever bear a close and mathematical relation to each other.

Ignorance and superstition ever bear a close and mathematical relation to each other.

To illustrate the difference between the innovator and the dull crowd of routinists who cannot even imagine that any improvement read more

To illustrate the difference between the innovator and the dull crowd of routinists who cannot even imagine that any improvement is possible, we need only refer to a passage in Engel's most famous book. Here, in 1878, Engels apodictically announced that military weapons are "now so perfected that no further progress of any revolutionizing influence is any longer possible." Henceforth "all further [technological] progress is by and large indifferent for land warfare. The age of evolution is in this regard essentially closed." This complacent conclusion shows in what the achievement of the innovator consists: he accomplishes what other people believe to be unthinkable and unfeasible.

Sin makes its own hell, and goodness its own heaven.

Sin makes its own hell, and goodness its own heaven.