“This is my firm persuasion, that since the human soul exerts itself with so great activity.”

I would not be beholden to a tyrant, for his acts of tyranny.

A honest man is seldom a vagrant.

I know not what treason is, if sapping and betraying the liberties of a people be not treason.

The best way to keep good acts in memory is to refresh them with new.

For it is but usurpation in him to save, as their rightful lord, the lives of men over whom he has no title to reign.

Art, and Industry, as far as by it he hurts not the Society, or any Members of it, by taking from any Member, or by hindering him from enjoying what he himself enjoys.

Blessed be they as virtuous, who when they feel their virile members swollen with lust, visit a brothel rather than grind at some husband’s private mill.

Regard not dreams, since they are but the images of our hopes and fears.

The cabbage surpasses all other vegetables. If, at a banquet, you wish to dine a lot and enjoy your dinner, then eat as much cabbage as you wish, seasoned with vinegar, before dinner, and likewise after dinner eat some half-dozen leaves.

Don’t promise twice what you can do at once.

Wise men are more dependent on fools than fools on wise men.

Never travel by sea when you can go by land.

The primary virtue is: hold your tongue; who knows how to keep quiet is close to God.

The Fruits of a Man’s honest Industry are the just Rewards of it, ascertained to him by natural and eternal Equity, as is his Title to use them in the Manner which he thinks fit: And thus, with the above Limitations, every Man is sole Lord and Arbitrer of his own private Actions and Property.

Good-breeding is the art of showing men, by external signs, the internal regard we have for them. It arises from good sense, improved by conversing with good company.

It is remarkable that men, when they differ in what they think considerable, will be apt to differ in almost everything else; their difference begets contradiction; contradiction begets heat; heat quickly rises into resentment, rage, and ill-will; thus they differ in affections, as they differ in judgment.

In a sense, speaking figuratively, to take one’s agency, that precious gift which the scriptures make plain is essential to life itself, and say, “I will do as you direct,” is afterward to learn that in so doing you possess it all the more.

I was watching one of those animal shows on the Discovery Channel. There was a guy inventing a shark bite suit. And there’s only one way to test it.

It is not enough to demand insight and informative images of reality from the theater. Our theater must stimulate a desire for understanding, a delight in changing reality.

I’ll admit that the discovery of evolution is humbling, but it is also empowering. It transforms our relationship to the life around us. Instead of being outsiders watching the natural world go by, we are insiders.

Columbus real achievement was managing to cross the ocean successfully in both directions. Though an accomplished enough mariner, he was not terribly good at a great deal else, especially geography, the skill that would seem most vital in an explorer.

If a government is to do great new things, it will need more support. If a government is to change the world, it will need mass support. This is one of the discoveries of modern government.

The new discovery of a 3.3 billion barrel oil deposit off Norway’s coast cements that nation’s claim to being Europe’s second largest oil producer.

The discovery informs about the origins and early evolution of arthropods, the most ubiquitous, species-rich, morphologically diverse and successful animal group on Earth.