“Animals, whom we have made our slaves, we do not like to consider our equal.”

The very essence of instinct is that it’s followed independently of reason.

Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge.

The most energetic workers I have encountered in my world travels are the vegetarian miners of Chile.

Building a better mousetrap merely results in smarter mice.

Often a cold shudder has run through me, and I have asked myself whether I may have not devoted myself to a fantasy.

Man, wonderful man, must collapse, into nature’s cauldron, he is no deity, he is no exception.

Even people who aren’t geniuses can outthink the rest of mankind if they develop certain thinking habits.

I love fools’ experiments. I am always making them.

I have called this principle, by which each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term of Natural Selection.

Man in his arrogance thinks himself a great work, worthy of the interposition of a deity. More humble, and I believe truer, to consider him created from animals.

It is a cursed evil to any man to become as absorbed in any subject as I am in mine.

If I had my life to live over again, I would have made a rule to read some poetry and listen to some music at least once every week.

Man selects only for his own good: Nature only for that of the being which she tends.

We stopped looking for monsters under our bed when we realized that they were inside us.

Nothing exists for itself alone, but only in relation to other forms of life.

The most powerful natural species are those that adapt to environmental change without losing their fundamental identity which gives them their competitive advantage.

You never know how a horse will pull until you hook him to a heavy load.

A time will come when instead of shepherds feeding the sheep, the church will have clowns entertaining the goats.

Having a teenage daughter is like riding a young horse over an unknown steeplechase course. You don’t know when to pull up the reins, when to let the horse have its head – or what.

I never said all actors are cattle; what I said was all actors should be treated like cattle.

If you can’t sleep, count sheep. Don’t count endangered animals. You will run out.

My trust in you is broken and I am plunged into despair for the animals.

In poverty she is envious. In riches she may be a snob. Money does not change the sickness, only the symptoms.

The people turn in allegiance to Humanity, as surely as water flows downward or as a wild animal takes cover in the wilderness.