“In almost any society I think, the quality of the nonconformists is likely to be just as good as and no better than that of the conformists.”

Through a grandmother’s voice and hands the end of life is known at the beginning.

There is no lonelier person than the one who lives with a spouse with whom he or she cannot communicate.

Don’t depend on governments or corporations to fix problems. Social revolutions are led by passionate individuals and that’s what makes the difference.

The way in which each human infant is transformed into the finished adult, into the complicated individual version of his city and his century is one of the most fascinating studies open to the curious minded.

One of the most dangerous things that can happen to a child is to kill or torture an animal and get away with it.

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.

It is utterly false and cruelly arbitrary. to put all the play and learning into childhood, all the work into middle age, and all the regrets into old age.

You can never have a relationship with someone whose smell you don’t like.

We grow up never questioning that which is unquestioned around us.

Where we choose to put our attention changes our brain, which in time can change how we see and interact with the world.

Manners, really good ones, make it possible to live with almost anyone, gracefully and pleasantly.

An education not founded on Art will never succeed.

The most intractable problem today is not pollution or technology or war; but the lack of belief that the future is very much in the hands of the individual.

To demand that another love what one loves is tyranny enough, but to demand that another hate what one hates, is even worse.

If one cannot state a matter clearly enough so that even an intelligent twelve-year-old can understand it, one should remain within the cloistered walls of the university and laboratory until one gets a better grasp of one’s subject matter.

Human beings seem to hold on more tenaciously to a cultural identity that is learned through suffering than to one that has been acquired through pleasure and delight.