“There is nothing so disastrous as a rational investment policy in an irrational world.”

Nor should the argument seem strange that taxation may be so high as to defeat its object, and that, given sufficient time to gather the fruits, a reduction of taxation will run a better chance than an increase of balancing the budget.

Conservatism leads nowhere; it satisfies no ideal.

A study of the history of opinion is a necessary preliminary to the emancipation of the mind.

When my information changes, I alter my conclusions. What do you do, sir?

If we consistently act on the optimistic hypothesis, this hypothesis will tend to be realised; whilst by acting on the pessimistic hypothesis we can keep ourselves for ever in the pit of want.

Economists must leave to Adam Smith alone the glory of the Quarto, must pluck the day, fling pamphlets into the wind, write always sub specie temporis , and achieve immortality by accident, if at all.

The introduction of a substantial Government transfer tax on all transactions might prove the most serviceable reform available,with a view to mitigating the predominance of speculation in the United States.

When I find new information I change my mind; What do you do?

The power to become habituated to his surroundings is a marked characteristic of mankind.

Never in history was there a method devised of such efficacy for setting each country’s advantage at variance with its neighbours’ as the international gold (or, formerly, silver) standard.

Once we allow ourselves to be disobedient to the test of an accountant’s profit, we have begun to change our civilization.

I think that Capitalism, wisely managed, can probably be made more efficient for attaining economic ends than any alternative system yet in sight, but that in itself is in many ways extremely objectionable.

One blames politicians, not for inconsistency but for obstinacy. They are the interpreters, not the masters, of our fate. It is their job, in fact, to register the fact accomplished.

When the accumulation of wealth is no longer of high social importance, there will be great changes in the code of morals.

The political problem of mankind is to combine three things: economic efficiency, social justice and individual liberty.

Experience shows that what happens is always the thing against which one has not made provision in advance.

It is not enough to have a talented designer; the management must be inspired too. The creative process is very disorganised; the production process has to be very rational.

I always knew that I was called to do something. I didn’t know what, but I finally rationalized after I met Martin [Luther King, Jr.] and it took a lot of praying to discover this, that this was probably what God had called me to do, to marry him.

My art is capable of liberating man from the tyranny of the practical, rational world.

Rationalization is a process of not perceiving reality, but of attempting to make reality fit one’s emotions.

The meme for blind faith secures its own perpetuation by the simple unconscious expedient of discouraging rational inquiry.

In both writing and sleeping, we learn to be physically still at the same time we are encouraging our minds to unlock from the humdrum rational thinking of our daytime lives.

Heaven forbid that we should believe in such a way as not to accept or seek reasons, since we could not even believe if we did not possess rational souls.

Failure comes from ego, greed, envy, fear, imitation. I have success not because I am smart, but because I am rational.