The wise learn from the experience of others, and the creative know how to make a crumb of experience go read more

The wise learn from the experience of others, and the creative know how to make a crumb of experience go a long way.

A line runs from the meditations of the heart to the words of the mouth. The meditations are not clear read more

A line runs from the meditations of the heart to the words of the mouth. The meditations are not clear to us until the mouth utters its words. If what the mouth utters is unclear or foolish or mendacious, it must be that the meditations are the same. But the line runs both ways. The words of the mouth will become the meditations of the heart, and the habit of loose talk loosens the fastenings of our understanding.

Facts per se can neither prove nor refute anything. Everything is decided by the interpretation and explanation of the facts, read more

Facts per se can neither prove nor refute anything. Everything is decided by the interpretation and explanation of the facts, by the ideas and the theories.

Anybody who is 25 or 30 years old has physical scars from all sorts of things, from tuberculosis to polio. read more

Anybody who is 25 or 30 years old has physical scars from all sorts of things, from tuberculosis to polio. It's the same with the mind.

Action based on reason, action therefore which is only to be understood by reason, knows only one end, the greatest read more

Action based on reason, action therefore which is only to be understood by reason, knows only one end, the greatest pleasure of the acting individual.

Indeed he knows not how to know who knows not also how to un-know.

Indeed he knows not how to know who knows not also how to un-know.

Thinking to get at once all the gold the Goose could give, he killed it and opened it only to read more

Thinking to get at once all the gold the Goose could give, he killed it and opened it only to find,- nothing.

Thought control, like birth control, is best undertaken as long as possible before the fact. Many grown-ups will obstinately persist, read more

Thought control, like birth control, is best undertaken as long as possible before the fact. Many grown-ups will obstinately persist, if only now and then, in composing small strings of sentences in their heads and achieving at least momentary logic. This probably cannot be prevented, but we have learned how to minimize the consequences by arranging that such grown-ups will be unable to pursue that logic very far. If they were at home in the technology of writing, there's no telling how much social disorder they would cause by thinking things out at length.Our schools have chosen to cut this danger off as close to the root as possible, thus taking measures to preclude not only the birth of thought but its conception. They give the pill to even the youngest children, but just to be on the safe side, they give it to everybody else, too, especially all would-be schoolteachers.

All greatness of character is dependent on individuality. The man who has no other existence than that which he partakes read more

All greatness of character is dependent on individuality. The man who has no other existence than that which he partakes in common with all around him, will never have any other than an existence of mediocrity.