“Perhaps; some day the precision of the data will be brought so far that the mathematician will be able to calculate at his desk the outcome of any chemical combination, in the same way, so to speak, as he calculates the motions of celestial bodies.”

This theory [the oxygen theory] is not as I have heard it described, that of the French chemists, it is mine (elle est la mienne); it is a property which I claim from my contemporaries and from posterity.

Nothing is lost, nothing is created, everything is transformed.

It is almost possible to predict one or two days in advance, within a rather broad range of probability, what the weather is going to be; it is even thought that it will not be impossible to publish daily forecasts, which would be very useful to soci.

One succeeds in obtaining an equivalent production at a lower price by improving the arts, trades and agriculture and by developing the physical and moral qualities of workers, farmers and craftsmen.

I consider nature a vast chemical laboratory in which all kinds of composition and decompositions are formed.

As ideas are preserved and communicated by means of words, it necessarily follows that we cannot improve the language of any science, without at the same time improving the science itself; neither can we, on the other hand, improve a science without improving the language or nomenclature which belongs to it.

In performing experiments, it is necessary… that they be simplified as much as possible, and that every circumstance that could complicate the results should be completely removed.

A wealthy landowner cannot cultivate and improve his farm without spreading comfort and well-being around him. Rich and abundant crops, a numerous population and a prosperous countryside are the rewards for his efforts.

Thus, while I thought myself employed only in forming a Nomenclature, and while I proposed to myself nothing more than to improve the chemical language, my work transformed itself by degrees, without my being able to prevent it, into a treatise upon the Elements of Chemistry.

We must trust to nothing but facts: These are presented to us by Nature, and cannot deceive. We ought, in every instance, to submit our reasoning to the test of experiment, and never to search for truth but by the natural road of experiment and observation.

It is not only by the pores of the skin that this aqueous emaciation takes place. A considerable quantity of humidity is also exhaled by the lungs at each expiration.

Vegetables are organized bodies that grow on the dry areas of the globe and within its waters. Their function is to combine immediately the four elements and to serve as food for animals.

Imagination, on the contrary, which is ever wandering beyond the bounds of truth, joined to self-love and that self-confidence we are so apt to indulge, prompt us to draw conclusions which are not immediately derived from facts.

It is impossible to disassociate language from science, To call forth a concept, a word is needed.

The whole art of making experiments in chemistry is founded on the principle: we must always suppose an exact equality or equation between the principles of the body examined and those of the products of its analysis.

Vegetation is the basic instrument the creator uses to set all of nature in motion.

Calculating selfishness is the annihilation of self.

When a peasant begins to feel the need for instruction, he usually becomes fiercely calculating.

Action on the move creates its own route, creates to a very great extent the conditions under which it is to be fulfilled and thus baffles all calculation.

We passed the Children’s Bureau bill calculated to prevent children from being employed too early in factories.

The most common misconception people have had in the past is about my own control and calculation of my career.

All our fret and worry is caused by calculating without God.

Fast food may appear to be cheap food and, in the literal sense it often is, but that is because huge social and environmental costs are being excluded from the calculations.

Instead of ignorance, I tasted what it might be like to finally be me. I didn’t give a show this time. I had no plan, no calculations. No scolding voice inside my head. For a little while, I was free.