Background Image

...

Cast Me Into A Dungeon, Burn Me At The Stake, Crown Me King Of Kings, I Can 'pursue Happiness' As Long As My Brain Lives - But Neither Gods Nor Saints, Wise Men Nor Subtle Drugs, Can Ensure That I Will Catch It.

-Robert A. Heinlein

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

Cast Me Into A

Robert A. Heinlein

...

Cast Me Into A Dungeon, Burn Me At The Stake, Crown Me King Of Kings, I Can 'pursue Happiness' As Long As My Brain Lives - But Neither Gods Nor Saints, Wise Men Nor Subtle Drugs, Can Ensure That I Will Catch It.

Views: 10

Topic

More From Robert A. Heinlein

Secrecy Is The Beginning Of Tyranny

Never Attribute To Malice That Which Can Be Adequately Explained By Stupidity. Never Underestimate The Power Of Human Stupidity.

But, If There Ever Was A Time In History When "peace" Meant That There Was No Fighting Going On, I Have Been Unable To Find Out About It.

The Ethics Of Sex Is A Thorny Problem. Each Of Us Is Forced To Grope For A Solution He Can Live With - In The Face Of Preposterous, Unworkable, And Evil Code Of So-called 'morals.' Most Of Us Know The Code Is Wrong, Almost Everybody Breaks It. But We Pay Danegeld By Feeling Guilty And Giving Lip Service. Willy-nilly, The Code Rides Us, Dead And Stinking, An Albatross Around The Neck.

Yes, Boss?' Dorcas, The Last Twenty Or Thirty Years I've Been A Worthless, No-good Parasite.' She Yawned Again. 'everybody Knows That.' Nevermind The Flattery. There Comes A Time In Every Man's Life When He Has To Stop Being Sensible--a Time To Stand Up And Be Counted--strike A Blow For Liberty--smite The Wicked.' Ummm...' So Quit Yawning, The Time Has Come.' She Glanced Down. 'maybe I Had Better Get Dressed.

Please Don't Invent A Debt That Does Not Exist, Or Next You Will Be Trying To Feel Gratitude - And That Is The Treacherous First Step Toward Complete Moral Degradation.

The Best Thing About Space Travel Is That It Made It Possible To Go Elsewhere.

You Can Go Wrong By Being Too Skeptical As Readily As By Being Too Trusting.

Some Logics Get Nervous Breakdowns. Overloaded Phone System Behaves Like Frightened Child. Mike Did Not Have Upsets, Acquired Sense Of Humor Instead. Low One. If He Were A Man, You Wouldn't Dare Stoop Over. His Idea Of Thigh-slapper Would Be To Dump You Out Of Bed — Or Put Itch Powder In Pressure Suit.

Logic Is A Feeble Reed, Friend. "logic" Proved That Airplanes Can't Fly And That H-bombs Won't Work And That Stones Don't Fall Out Of The Sky. Logic Is A Way Of Saying That Anything Which Didn't Happen Yesterday Won't Happen Tomorrow.

It May Take Endless Wars And Unbearable Population Pressure To Force-feed A Technology To The Point Where It Can Cope With Space. In The Universe, Space Travel May Be The Normal Birth Pangs Of An Otherwise Dying Race. A Test. Some Races Pass, Some Fail.

Talking With A Martian Is Like Talking With An Echo. You Don't Get Argument But You Don't Get Results.

Touch Is The Most Fundamental Sense. A Baby Experiences It, All Over, Before He Is Born And Long Before He Learns To Use Sight, Hearing, Or Taste, And No Human Ever Ceases To Need It. Keep Your Children Short On Pocket Money But Long On Hugs

The 3-legged Stool Of Understanding Is Held Up By History, Languages, And Mathematics. Equipped With Those Three You Can Learn Anything You Want To Learn. But If You Lack Any One Of Them You Are Just Another Ignorant Peasant With Dung On Your Boots.

If You Don't Like Yourself, You Can't Like Other People. -- Lazarus Long.

Decency Is Not News; It Is Buried In The Obituaries - But It Is A Force Stronger Than Crime.

Anyone Who Cannot Cope With Mathematics Is Not Fully Human. At Best, He Is A Tolerable Subhuman Who Has Learned To Wear His Shoes, Bathe, And Not Make Messes In The House.

Most People Can't Think, Most Of The Remainder Won't Think, And The Small Fraction Who Do Think Mostly Can't Do It Very Well.

I've Found Out Why People Laugh. They Laugh Because It Hurts- Because It's The Only Thing That'll Make It Stop Hurting... I Had Been Told That A 'funny' Thing Is A Thing Of Goodness. It Isn't... The Goodness Is In The Laughing. I Grok It Is A Bravery- And A Sharing- Against Pain And Sorrow And Defeat.

Autobiography Is Usually Honest But It Is Never Truthful.

English Is The Largest Of Human Tongues, With Several Times The Vocabulary Of The Second Largest Language -- This Alone Made It Inevitable That English Would Eventually Become, As It Did, The Lingua Franca Of This Planet, For It Is Thereby The Richest And Most Flexible -- Despite Its Barbaric Accretions . . . Or, I Should Say, Because Of Its Barbaric Accretions. English Swallows Up Anything That Comes Its Way, Makes English Out Of It.

Daughters Can Spend Ten Percent More Than A Man Can Make In Any Usual Occupation. That’s A Law Of Nature, To Be Known Henceforth As ‘harshaw’s Law.

Man Can Be Chained, But He Cannot Be Domesticated.

Of All The Nonsense That Twists The World, The Concept Of 'altruism' Is The Worst. People Do What They Want To, Every Time. If It Pains Them To Make A Choice - If The Choice Looks Like A 'sacrifice' - You Can Be Sure That It Is No Nobler Than The Discomfort Caused By Greediness... The Necessity Of Deciding Between Two Things You Want When You Can't Have Both.

The Moral Difference Between A Soldier And A Civilian Is That The Soldier Accepts Personal Responsibility For The Safety Of The Body Politic Of Which He Is A Member. The Civilian Does Not.

The Ordinary Bloke Will Not Voluntarily Pay For "art" That Leaves Him Unmoved--if He Does Pay For It, The Money Has To Be Conned Out Of Him, By Taxes And Such.

When The Citizens Of A Nation Will No Longer Volunteer To Defend It, Then It Is Probably Not Worth Saving. No Nation Has The Right To Survive With Conscript Troops, And In The Long Run, No Nation Ever Has.

An Armed Man Need Not Fight.

A Critic Is A Man Who Creates Nothing And Thereby Feels Qualified To Judge The Work Of Creative Men. There Is Logic In This; He Is Unbiased, He Hates All Creative People Equally.

By The Data To Date, There Is Only One Animal In The Galaxy Dangerous To Man -- Man Himself. So He Must Supply His Own Indispensable Competition. He Has No Enemy To Help Him.

I Would Say That My Position Is Not Too Far From That Of Ayn Rand's; That I Would Like To See Government Reduced To No More Than Internal Police And Courts, External Armed Forces - With The Other Matters Handled Otherwise. I'm Sick Of The Way Government Sticks Its Nose In Everything, Now.

Cats Have No Sense Of Humor, They Have Terribly Inflated Egos, And They Are Very Touchy.

A Managed Democracy Is A Wonderful Thing... For The Managers... And Its Greatest Strength Is A 'free Press' When 'free' Is Defined As 'responsible' And The Managers Define What Is 'irresponsible'.

I'm Always Suspicious Of Disinterested Interest.

Being Right Too Soon Is Socially Unacceptable.

Make Money, Lose Money - Who Cares? The Idea Is To Enjoy It.

Writing Is Not Necessarily Something To Be Ashamed Of, But Do It In Private And Wash Your Hands Afterwards.

We Came Here For A Small, Informal Meeting. We Find You've Turned It Into A Circus. Well, If You're Going To Have A Circus, You've Got To Have Elephants.

You're In Bad Shape When Your Emotions Force You Into Acts Which You Know Are Foolish.

Luck Is A Tag Given By The Mediocre To Account For The Accomplishments Of Genius.

Money Is Truthful. If A Man Speaks Of His Honor, Make Him Pay Cash.

Happiness Consists In Getting Enough Sleep. Just That, Nothing More.

I Came, I Saw, She Conquered." The Original Latin Seems To Have Been Garbled.

Why Don't They Make More Science Fiction Movies? The Answer To Any Question Starting, Why Don't They- Is Almost Always, Money.

Does History Record Any Case In Which The Majority Was Right?

If A Thing's Worth Doing, It's Worth Overdoing. (lazarus Long)

From Somewhere, Back In My Youth, Heard Prof Say, 'manuel, When Faced With A Problem You Do Not Understand, Do Any Part Of It You Do Understand, Then Look At It Again.' He Had Been Teaching Me Something He Himself Did Not Understand Very Well—something In Math—but Had Taught Me Something Far More Important, A Basic Principle.

Budget The Luxuries First.

In Past History Popularly Elected Governments Have Been No Better And Sometimes Far Worse Than Overt Tyrannies.

By Cultivating The Beautiful We Scatter The Seeds Of Heavenly Flowers, As By Doing Good We Cultivate Those That Belong To Humanity.

You Live And Learn. Or You Don't Live Long.

My Vocal Cords Lived Their Own Life, Wild And Free.

Little Girls, Like Butterflies, Need No Excuse.

Mom And Daughter

Love Is That Condition In Which The Happiness Of Another Person Is Essential To Your Own... Jealousy Is A Disease, Love Is A Healthy Condition. The Immature Mind Often Mistakes One For The Other, Or Assumes That The Greater The Love, The Greater The Jealousy.

In The Absence Of Clearly-defined Goals, We Become Strangely Loyal To Performing Daily Trivia Until Ultimately We Become Enslaved By It.

When The Need Arises - And It Does - You Must Be Able To Shoot Your Own Dog. Don't Farm It Out — That Doesn't Make It Nicer, It Makes It Worse.

There Are A Dozen Different Ways Of Delivering Destruction In Impersonal Wholesale, Via Ships Or Missiles Of One Sort Or Another, Catastrophes So Widespread, So Unselective That The War Is Over Because That Nation Or Planet Has Ceased To Exist. What We Do Is Entirely Different. We Make War As Personal As A Punch In The Nose. We Can Be Selective, Applying Precisely The Required Amount Of Pressure At The Specified Point At A Designated Time. We've Never Been Told To Go Down And Kill Or Capture All Left-handed Redheads In A Particular Area, But If They Tell Us To, We Can. We Will.

Pain Is The Basic Mechanism Built Into Us By Millions Of Years Of Evolution Which Safeguards Us By Warning When Something Threatens Our Survival.

Do This. Don't Do That. Stay Back In Line. Where's Tax Receipt? Fill Out Form. Let's See License. Submit Six Copies. Exit Only. No Left Turn. No Right Turn. Queue Up And Pay Fine. Take Back And Get Stamped. Drop Dead— But First Get Permit.

My Old Man Says When It's Time To Be Counted, The Important Thing Is To Be Man Enough To Stand Up.

Hate Always Sells Well, But For Repeat Trade And The Long Pull Happiness Is Sounder Merchandise.

I Think That Science Fiction Has A Distinct Therapeutic Value Because All Of It Has As Its Primary Postulate That The World Does Change. I Cannot Overemphasize The Importance Of That Idea.

Thinking Doesn't Pay. Just Makes You Discontented With What You See Around You.

Jill: 'i Don't Pay Attention To Politics.' Ben: 'you Should. It's Barely Less Important Than Your Own Heart Beat.' Jill: 'i Don't Pay Attention To That, Either.'

Spacemen - Men Who Work In Space, Pilots And Jetmen And Astrogators And Such - Are Men Who Like A Few Million Miles Of Elbow Room.

Always Cut The Cards...and Smile When You Lose.

Take Big Bites. Anything Worth Doing Is Worth Overdoing.

Anything Worth Doing

Faith Is Intellectual Laziness.

Intellectual Laziness

Always Listen To Experts. They'll Tell You What Can't Be Done, And Why. Then Do It.

Humoring Them Costs Nothing And Adds To Happiness In A World In Which Happiness Is Always In Short Supply.

I Am Free, No Matter What Rules Surround Me. If I Find Them Tolerable, I Tolerate Them; If I Find Them Too Obnoxious, I Break Them. I Am Free Because I Know That I Alone Am Morally Responsible For Everything I Do.

I Don't See How An Article Of Clothing Can Be Indecent. A Person, Yes.

You Have To Give An Editor Something To Change, Or He Gets Fretful. After He Pees In It, He Likes The Flavor Better, So He Buys It.

A Woman Is Not Property, And Husbands Who Think Otherwise Are Living In A Dreamworld.

If I Had A Boy Scout I Could Make A Fire By Rubbing His Hind Legs Together.

Take Care Of The Cojones And The Frijoles Will Take Care Of Themselves. Try To Have Getaway Money - But Don't Be Fanatic About It.

You Can Have Peace. Or You Can Have Freedom. Don't Ever Count On Having Both At Once.

Political Tags - Such As Royalist, Communist, Democrat, Populist, Fascist, Liberal, Conservative, And So Forth - Are Never Basic Criteria. The Human Race Divides Politically Into Those Who Want People To Be Controlled And Those Who Have No Such Desire.

A Committee Is A Life Form With Six Or More Legs And No Brain.

Faith Strikes Me As Intellectual Laziness.

Art Is The Process Of Evoking Pity And Terror, Which Is Not Abstract At All But Very Human. What The Self-styled Modern Artists Are Doing Is A Sort Of Unemotional Pseudointellectual Masturbation . . . Whereas Creative Art Is More Like Intercourse, In Which The Artist Must Seduce -- Render Emotional -- His Audience, Each Time.

Avoid Making Irrevocable Decisions While Tired Or Hungry.

The Greatest Fallacy Of Democracy Is That Everyone's Opinion Is Worth The Same.

There Is No Worse Tyranny Than To Force A Man To Pay For What He Does Not Want Merely Because You Think It Would Be Good For Him.

You Got The Impression That He Never Needed To Sleep - Just Ten-thousand-mile Checkups And Dust Him Off Occasionally.

Courage Is The Complement Of Fear. A Man Who Is Fearless Cannot Be Courageous. [he Is Also A Fool.]

The Stone Trembled And Threw Herself Outward Bound, Toward Saturn. In Her Train Followed Hundreds And Thousands And Hundreds Of Thousands Of Thousands Of Restless, Rolling Stones . . . To Saturn . . . To Uranus, To Pluto . . . Rolling On Out To The Stars . . . Outward Bound To The Ends Of The Universe.

One Should Not Attend Even The End Of The World Without A Good Breakfast.

End Of The World

Figure Out For Yourself What You Want To Be Really Good At, Know That You'll Never Really Satisfy Yourself That You've Made It, And Accept That That's Okay.

If You Are Part Of A Society That Votes, Then Do So. There May Be No Candidates And No Measures You Want To Vote For ... But There Are Certain To Be Ones You Want To Vote Against. In Case Of Doubt, Vote Against. By This Rule You Will Rarely Go Wrong.

Circumstances Can Force Your Hand. So Think Ahead!

Responsibility Cannot Be Shared.

Sex, Whatever Else It Is, Is An Athletic Skill. The More You Practice, The More You Can, The More You Want To, The More You Enjoy It, The Less It Tires You.

Take Sides! Always Take Sides! You Will Sometimes Be Wrong - But The Man Who Refuses To Take Sides Must Always Be Wrong.

If You've Got The Truth You Can Demonstrate It. Talking Doesn't Prove It.

When Any Government, Or Any Church For That Matter, Undertakes To Say To Its Subjects, This You May Not Read, This You Must Not See, This You Are Forbidden To Know, The End Result Is Tyranny And Oppression No Matter How Holy The Motives.

Sex Should Be Friendly. Otherwise Stick To Mechanical Toys; It's More Sanitary.

Nothing Uses Up Alcohol Faster Than Political Argument.

It Is A Bad Sign When The People Of A Country Stop Identifying Themselves With The Country And Start Identifying With A Group. A Racial Group. Or A Religion. Or A Language. Anything, As Long As It Isn't The Whole Population.

There Has Grown Up In The Minds Of Certain Groups In This Country The Notion That Because A Man Or Corporation Has Made A Profit Out Of The Public For A Number Of Years, The Government And The Courts Are Charged With The Duty Of Guaranteeing Such Profit In The Future, Even In The Face Of Changing Circumstances And Contrary Public Interest. This Strange Doctrine Is Not Supported By Statute Nor Common Law. Neither Individuals Nor Corporations Have Any Right To Come Into Court And Ask That The Clock Of History Be Stopped, Or Turned Back...

There Are Perhaps 5% Of The Population That Simply Can't Think. There Are Another 5% Who Can, And Do. The Remaining 90% Can Think, But Don't

Straining At Gnats And Swallowing Camels Is A Required Course In Law Schools.

History Is Never Surprising After It Happens.

I Scrolled On Down To The Obituaries. I Usually Read The Obituaries First As There Is Always The Happy Chance That One Of Them Will Make My Day.

The Meek Shall Inherit The Earth - A 6 Foot Plot Above Them.

Do Not Confuse "duty" With What Other People Expect Of You; They Are Utterly Different. Duty Is A Debt You Owe To Yourself To Fulfill Obligations You Have Assumed Voluntarily. Paying That Debt Can Entail Anything From Years Of Patient Work To Instant Willingness To Die. Difficult It May Be, But The Reward Is Self-respect.

First You Must Learn To Control Your Self. The Rest Follows. Blessed Is He Who Knows Himself And Commands Himself, For The World Is His And Love And Happiness And Peace Walk With Him Wherever He Goes.

At Least Once Every Human Should Have To Run For His Life, To Teach Him That Milk Does Not Come From Supermarkets, That Safety Does Not Come From Policemen, That 'news' Is Not Something That Happens To Other People. He Might Learn How His Ancestors Lived And That He Himself Is No Different--in The Crunch His Life Depends On His Agility, Alertness, And Personal Resourcefulness.

There Are Things Which Cannot Be Taught In Ten Easy Lessons, Nor Popularized For The Masses; They Take Years Of Skull Sweat.

One Man's 'magic' Is Another Man's Engineering. 'supernatural' Is A Null Word.

What We Think Of As 'physical Beauty' Is Almost Certainly A Tag For A Complex Of Useful Survival Characteristics. Smartness - Intelligence - Among Them.

Butterflies Are Not Insects,' Captain John Sterling Said Soberly. 'they Are Self-propelled Flowers.

A Competent And Self-confident Person Is Incapable Of Jealousy In Anything. Jealousy Is Invariably A Symptom Of Neurotic Insecurity.

The Nice Thing About Citing God As An Authority Is That You Can Prove Anything You Set Out To Prove.

The Commonest Weakness Of Our Race Is Our Ability To Rationalize Our Most Selfish Purposes.

Audacity, Always Audacity - Soundest Principal Of Strategy.

Never Attempt To Teach A Pig To Sing; It Wastes Your Time And Annoys The Pig.

English Is Capable Of Defining Sentiments That The Human Nervous System Is Quite Incapable Of Experiencing.

English Language

Being Sorry Won't Get You Into Heaven. Get Happy, Son. Get That Old Spring Into Your Step And Stay On Your Toes.

Most People Who Sneer At Technology Would Starve To Death If The Engineering Infrastructure Were Removed.

Expertise In One Field Does Not Carry Over Into Other Fields. But Experts Often Think So. The Narrower Their Field Of Knowledge The More Likely They Are To Think So.

Man Has No Moral Instinct. He Is Not Born With Moral Sense. You Were Not Born With It, I Was Not - And A Puppy Has None. We Acquire Moral Sense, When We Do, Through Training, Experience, And Hard Sweat Of The Mind.

Learn To Say No—and To Be Rude About It When Necessary. Otherwise You Will Not Have Time To Carry Out Your Duty, Or To Do Your Own Work, And Certainly No Time For Love And Happiness. The Termites Will Nibble Away Your Life And Leave None Of It For You.

Happiness And Love

His Older Self Had Taught His Younger Self A Language Which The Older Self Knew Because The Younger Self, After Being Taught, Grew Up To Be The Older Self And Was, Therefore, Capable Of Teaching.

Once A Month, Some Women Act Like Men Act All The Time.

Women Are Amazing Creatures-sweet, Soft, Gentle, And Far More Savage Than We Are.

All My Enemies Are Self-appointed.

It Seems To Me That The Secret Of True Happiness In Life Is To Know What You Are And Then Be Content To Be That, In Style, Head Up And Proud, And Not Yearn To Be Something Else.

It's Up To The Artist To Use Language That Can Be Understood, Not Hide It In Some Private Code. Most Of These Jokers Don't Even Want To Use Language You And I Know Or Can Learn . . . They Would Rather Sneer At Us And Be Smug, Because We 'fail' To See What They Are Driving At. If Indeed They Are Driving At Anything--obscurity Is Usually The Refuge Of Incompetence.

I Have Never Been Able To See How A Thirty-year Old Moron Can Vote More Wisely Than A Fifteen-year Old Genius.

Under What Circumstances Is It Moral For A Group To Do That Which Is Not Moral For A Member Of That Group To Do Alone?

Love Your Country, But Never Trust Its Government.

A Community Where Everyone Is A Ruthless Murderer, With Handy Access To Death-dealing Devices, Is A Very Polite Community.

Waking A Person Unnecessarily Should Not Be Considered A Capital Crime. For A First Offense, That Is.

There Is No Such Thing As 'social Gambling.' Either You Are There To Cut The Other Bloke's Heart Out And Eat It -- Or You're A Sucker. If You Don't Like This Choice -- Don't Gamble.

I Think Perhaps Of All The Things A Police State Can Do To Its Citizens, Distorting History Is Possibly The Most Pernicious.

My Old Man Claimed That The More Complicated The Law The More Opportunity For Scoundrels.

When I Don’t Understand, I Have An Unbearable Itch To Know Why.

Liberty Is Never Unalienable, It Must Be Redeemed Regularly With The Blood Of Patriots Or It Always Vanishes.

Unalienable Rights

How Can I Possibly Put A New Idea Into Your Heads, If I Do Not First Remove Your Delusions?

The First Principle Of Freedom Is The Right To Go To Hell In Your Own Handbasket.

What Are The Facts? Again And Again And Again – What Are The Facts? Shun Wishful Thinking, Ignore Divine Revelation, Forget What “the Stars Foretell,” Avoid Opinion, Care Not What The Neighbors Think, Never Mind The Unguessable “verdict Of History” – What Are The Facts, And To How Many Decimal Places? You Pilot Always Into An Unknown Future; Facts Are Your Single Clue. Get The Facts!

Get A Shot Off Fast. This Upsets Him Long Enough To Let You Make Your Second Shot Perfect.

Government! Three-fourths Parasitic And The Rest Stupid Fumbling - Oh, Harshaw Concluded That Man, A Social Animal, Could Not Avoid Government, Any More Than An Individual Could Escape Bondage To His Bowels. But Simply Because An Evil Was Inescapable Was No Reason To Term It "good." He Wished That Government Would Wander Off And Get Lost! (96)

Most 'scientists' Are Bottle Washers And Button Sorters.

Gentlemen, Let's Go Row!

In Wilson's Scale Of Evaluations Breakfast Rated Just After Life Itself And Ahead Of The Chance Of Immortality.

If You Happen To Be One Of The Fretful Minority Who Can Do Creative Work, Never Force An Idea; You'll Abort It If You Do. Be Patient And You'll Give Birth To It When The Time Is Ripe. Learn To Wait.

Being Privileged To Work Hard For Long Hours At Something You Think Is Worth Doing Is The Best Kind Of Play.

Another Ingredient In A Happy Marriage: Budget The Luxuries First!

Sovereign," Like "love," Means Anything You Want It To Mean; It's A Word In Dictionary Between "sober" And "sozzled.

Our Behavior Is Different. How Often Have You Seen A Headline Like This?--two Die Attempting Rescue Of Drowning Child. If A Man Gets Lost In The Mountains, Hundreds Will Search And Often Two Or Three Searchers Are Killed. But The Next Time Somebody Gets Lost Just As Many Volunteers Turn Out. Poor Arithmetic, But Very Human. It Runs Through All Our Folklore, All Human Religions, All Our Literature--a Racial Conviction That When One Human Needs Rescue, Others Should Not Count The Price.

I Have Never Been Impressed By The Formal Schools Of Ethics.

Being Generous Is Inborn; Being Altruistic Is A Learned Perversity. No Resemblance --

Progress Is Made By Lazy Men Looking For Easier Ways To Do Things.

A Committee Is The Only Known Form Of Life With A Hundred Bellies And No Brain.

Once A Man Gets A Reputation As A Liar, He Might As Well Be Struck Dumb, For People Do Not Listen To The Wind.

- I'm So Busy Doing What I Must Do That I Don't Have Time For What I Ought To Do... And I Never Get A Chance To Do What I Want To Do! - Son, That's Universal. The Way To Keep That Recipe From Killing You Is Occasionally To Do What You Want To Do Anyhow.

Delusions Are Often Functional. A Mother's Opinions About Her Children's Beauty, Intelligence, Goodness, Et Cetera Ad Nauseam, Keep Her From Drowning Them At Birth.

Democracy Can't Work. Mathematicians, Peasants, And Animals, That's All There Is - So Democracy, A Theory Based On The Assumption That Mathematicians And Peasants Are Equal, Can Never Work. Wisdom Is Not Additive; Its Maximum Is That Of The Wisest Man In A Given Group.

Anything Free Is Worth What You Pay For It.

One Could Write A History Of Science In Reverse By Assembling The Solemn Pronouncements Of Highest Authority About What Could Not Be Done And Could Never Happen.

Why Do Some People Act As If Making Money Offended Their Delicate Minds? I Am Out For A Legitimate Profit, And Not Ashamed Of It; The Fact That People Will Pay Money For My Goods And Services Shows That My Work Is Useful.

My Dear, I Used To Think I Was Serving Humanity . . . And I Pleasured In The Thought. Then I Discovered That Humanity Does Not Want To Be Served; On The Contrary It Resents Any Attempt To Serve It. So Now I Do What Pleases Myself.

There Were Many, Many Times Thereafter That Don Regretted Having Enlisted - But So Has Every Man Who Ever Volunteered For Military Service.

A Zest For Living Must Include A Willingness To Die.

Ability Is A Wonderful Thing, But Its Value Is Greatly Enhanced By Dependability. Ability Implies Repeatability And Accountability.

There Are Two Ways Of Forming An Opinion. One Is The Scientific Method; The Other, The Scholastic. To The Scientific Mind, Experimental Proof Is All-important, And Theory Is Merely A Convenience In Description, To Be Junked When It No Longer Fits. To The Academic Mind, Authority Is Everything, And Facts Are Junked When They Do Not Fit Theory.

Never Encourage A Man To Cook Breakfast; It Cause Him To Wonder If Women Are Necessary.

A Human Being Has No Natural Rights Of Any Nature.

Pacifism Is A Shifty Doctrine Under Which A Man Accepts The Benefits Of The Social Group Without Being Willing To Pay; And Claims A Halo For His Dishonesty.

Sense Is Never Common.

To Stay Young Requires Unceasing Cultivation Of The Ability To Unlearn Old Falsehoods.

"i've Found Out Why People Laugh. They Laugh Because It Hurts So Much... Because It's The Only Thing That'll Make It Stop Hurting" ... "but That's Not All People Laugh At." "isn't It? Perhaps I Don't Grok All Its Fullness Yet. But Find Me Something That Really Makes You Laugh Sweetheart... A Joke, Or Anything Else- But Something That Gave You A A Real Belly Laugh, Not A Smile. Then We'll See If There Isn't A Wrongness Wasn't There." He Thought. "i Grok When Apes Learn To Laugh, They'll Be People."

Minimize Your Therbligs Until It Becomes Automatic; This Doubles Your Effective Lifetime - And Thereby Gives Time To Enjoy Butterflies And Kittens And Rainbows.

I Counted To Ten Slowly, Using Binary Notation.

In A Dilemma, It Is Helpful To Change Any Variable, Then Reexamine The Problem.

Life Is Short, But The Years Are Long.

Women Will Forgive Anything. Otherwise, The Race Would Have Died Out Long Ago.

Don't Appeal To Mercy To God The Father Up In The Sky, Little Man, Because He's Not At Home And Never Was At Home, And Couldn't Care Less. What You Do With Yourself, Whether You Are Happy Or Unhappy- Live Or Die- Is Strictly Your Business And The Universe Doesn't Care. In Fact You May Be The Universe And The Only Cause Of All Your Troubles. But, At Best, The Most You Can Hope For Is Comradeship With Comrades No More Divine (or Just As Divine) As You Are. So Quit Sniveling And Face Up To It- 'thou Art God!'

Victory In Defeat, There Is None Higher. She Didn't Give Up, Ben; She's Still Trying To Lift That Stone After It Has Crushed Her. She's A Father Working While Cancer Eats Away His Insides, To Bring Home One More Pay Check. She's A Twelve-year-old Trying To Mother Her Brothers And Sisters Because Mama Had To Go To Heaven. She's A Switchboard Operator Sticking To Her Post While Smoke Chokes Her And Fire Cuts Off Her Escape. She's All The Unsung Heroes Who Couldn't Make It But Never Quit.

The Golden Sunshine Of Italy Congealed Into Tears. Here's To Alcoholic Brotherhood ... Much More Suited To The Frail Human Soul, If Any, Than Any Other Sort.

Belief Gets In The Way Of Learning.

The Worst That Can Possibly Have Happened To Him Is Death And That We Are All In For---if Not This Morning, Then In Days, Or Weeks, Or Years At Most.

The Right To Figure Things Out For Yourself Is The Only True Freedom Everyone Shares. Go Use It.

If You Pray Hard Enough, Water Will Run Uphill. How Hard? Why, Hard Enough To Make Water Run Uphill, Of Course!

Churches Thrive On Martyrdom And Persecution.

Love Is What Still Goes On When You're Not Horny.

Nothing Of Value Is Free. Even The Breath Of Life Is Purchased At Birth Only Through Gasping Effort And Pain.

If I Don’t Start Having Service I’m Going To Swap You All For A Dog And Shoot The Dog.

Men Are Expendable; Women And Children Are Not. A Tribe Or A Nation Can Lose A High Percentage Of Its Men And Still Pick Up The Pieces And Go On ... As Long As The Women And Children Are Saved.

The Correct Way To Punctuate A Sentence That States: "of Course It Is None Of My Business, But -- " Is To Place A Period After The Word "but." Don't Use Excessive Force In Supplying Such A Moron With A Period. Cutting His Throat Is Only A Momentary Pleasure And Is Bound To Get You Talked About.

Contemplation Must Bring Forth Right Action In Order To Permit Further Growth.

People Who Go Broke In A Big Way Never Miss Any Meals. It Is The Poor Jerk Who Is Shy A Half Slug Who Must Tighten His Belt.

Whoring Is Like Military Service...okay In The Upper Brackets, Not So Good Lower Down.

Military Service

Random Chance Was Not A Sufficient Explanation Of The Universe---in Fact, Random Chance Was Not Sufficient To Explain Random Chance; The Pot Could Not Hold Itself.

The Killer Looked Up As The Bullet Hit Him. He Looked As If He Were Puzzled By Some Strange Occurence, Being Too Freshly Dead To Be Aware Of It.

Geniuses And Supergeniuses Always Make Their Own Rules About Sex As On Everything Else; They Do Not Accept The Monkey Customs Of Their Lessers.

The Ten Commandments Are For Lame Brains. The First Five Are Solely For The Benefit Of The Priests And The Powers That Be; The Second Five Are Half Truths, Neither Complete Nor Adequate.

The Supreme Irony Of Life Is That Hardly Anyone Gets Out Of It Alive.

Trending Author

David Attenborough

Richard Dawkins

Benjamin E. Mays

Category