“The aim of argument, or of discussion, should not be victory but progress.”

A theory that explains everything, explains nothing.

If our civilization is to survive, we must break with the habit of deference to great men.

The simple truth is that truth is hard to come by, and that once found may easily be lost again.

The quest for precision is analogous to the quest for certainty, and both should be abandoned.

Every intellectual has a very special responsibility. He has the privilege and the opportunity of studying.

If you can’t say it simply and clearly, keep quiet, and keep working on it till you can.

“We don’t know anything” and believed that this was the most important philosophical truth.

While differing widely in the various little bits we know, in our infinite ignorance we are all equal.

We can all participate in the heritage of man. We all can help to preserve it. And we can all make our own modest contribution to it.

We all have an unscientific weakness for being always in the right, and this weakness seems to be particularly common among professional and amateur politicians.

History has no meaning.

I hold that he who teaches that not reason but love should rule opens up the way for those who rule by hate.

Great men may make great mistakes.

What we need and what we want is to moralize politics, not to politicize morals.

Our knowledge can only be finite, while our ignorance must necessarily be infinite.

If we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.

To argue with a man who has renounced the use and authority of reason, and whose philosophy consists in holding humanity in contempt, is like administering medicine to the dead, or endeavoring to convert an atheist by scripture.

A man lives by believing something: not by debating and arguing about many things.

It’s unarguable that the right shoes can really add elegance to an outfit and to the person who’s wearing them. Take a pair of high heels, for instance. Suddenly, you’re looking taller, shoulders back, body curved.

When heart speaks and heart listens, harmony is produced. When head talks and head listens, argument is produced.

If you want to stop an argument, close your mouth.

Liberty is a great celestial Goddess, strong, beneficent, and austere, and she can never descend upon a nation by the shouting of crowds, nor by arguments of unbridled passion, nor by the hatred of class against class.

Whenever you argue with another wiser than yourself in order that others may admire your wisdom, they will discover your ignorance.

Underlying most arguments against the free market is a lack of belief in freedom itself.