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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.

-Robert A. Heinlein

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It Seems To Me

Robert A. Heinlein

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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.

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More From Robert A. Heinlein

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?

Tilting At Windmills Hurts You More Than The Windmills.

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

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.

Like Every Living Thing Its Prime Characteristic Is A Blind, Unreasoned Instinct To Survive.

Stranger In A Strange Land

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.

The Country And Culture Commonly Known As "america" Had Had A Badly Split Personality All Through Its History. Its Overt Laws Were Almost Always Puritanical For A People Whose Covert Behavior Tended To Be Rabelaisian; Its Major Religions Were All Apollonian In Varying Degrees---its Religious Revivals Were Often Hysterical In A Fashion Almost Dionysian.

Don't Handicap Your Children By Making Their Lives Easy.

I Don't Know Who Is Cranking; I'm Pleased He Doesn't Stop.

Never Insult Anyone By Accident.

All My Enemies Are Self-appointed.

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.

Long Human Words (the Longer The Better) Were Easy, Unmistakable, And Rarely Changed Their Meanings . . . But Short Words Were Slippery, Unpredictable, Changing Their Meanings Without Any Pattern.

Stinky Says Women Should Be Obscene But Not Heard.

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

When Railroading Time Comes You Can Railroad—but Not Before.

Civilians Are Like Beans; You Buy 'em As Needed For Any Job Which Merely Requires Skill And Savvy. But You Can't Buy Fighting Spirit.

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

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

Anything Will Burn With Enough Gasoline And Dynamite.

Being Right Too Soon Is Socially Unacceptable.

Hit It! You Have To Hit It Harder Than That. Electrons Are Timid Little Things But Notional; You Have To Let Them Know Who’s Boss.

A Handy Short Definition Of Almost All Science Fiction Might Read: Realistic Speculation About Possible Future Events, Based Solidly On Adequate Knowledge Of The Real World, Past And Present, And On A Thorough Understanding Of The Nature And Significance Of The Scientific Method.

Thorough Understanding

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.

To Assess The Intelligence Of A Committee, Divide The Iq Of Its Stupidest Member By The Number Of Members.

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

But When They Began Handing Out Doctorates For Comparative Folk Dancing And Advanced Fly-fishing, I Became Too Stink In’ Proud To Use The Title. I Won’t Touch Watered Whiskey And I Take No Pride In Watered-down Degrees.

An Armed Society Is A Polite Society. Manners Are Good When One May Have To Back Up His Acts With His Life.

Man Can Be Chained, But He Cannot Be Domesticated.

Unarmed Hand-to-hand Fighting Does Not Change Through The Ages; Only The Name Changes, And It Has Only One Rule: Do It First, Do It Fast, Do It Dirtiest.

Sex Without Love Is Merely Healthy Exercise.

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

Time Is Your Total Capital, And The Minutes Of Your Life Are Painfully Few.

Never Tease An Old Dog; He Might Have One Bite Left.

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.

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

He Should Have Known Better Because, Early In His Learnings Under His Brother Mahmoud, He Had Discovered That Long Human Words (the Longer The Better) Were Easy, Unmistakable, And Rarely Changed Their Meanings, But Short Words Were Slippery, Unpredictable Changing Their Meanings Without Any Pattern. Or So He Seemed To Grok. Short Human Words Were Never Like A Short Martian Word - Such As Grok Which Forever Meant Exactly The Same Thing. Short Human Words Were Like Trying To Lift Water With A Knife. And This Had Been A Very Short Word.

Learning . . . Is - Also An End In Itself.

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

The Saddest Thing About Ephemerals Was That Their Little Lives Rarely Held Time Enough For Love.

Working Because You Want To Is The Best Sort Of Play.

It Is Impossible For A Man To Love His Wife Whole Heartedly Without Loving All Women Somewhat. I Suppose That The Converse Must Be True Of Women.

I Believe That This Hairless Embryo With The Aching, Oversize Brain Case And The Opposable Thumb, This Animal Barely Up From The Apes, Will Endure --will Endure Longer Than His Home Planet, Will Spread Out To The Other Planets, To The Stars, And Beyond, Carrying With Him His Honesty, His Insatiable Curiosity, His Unlimited Courage --and His Noble Essential Decency. This I Believe With All My Heart.

Behind Every Mystery Lies Another Mystery.

A Dying Culture Invariably Exhibits Personal Rudeness. Bad Manners. Lack Of Consideration For Others In Minor Matters. A Loss Of Politeness, Of Gentle Manners, Is More Significant Than Is A Riot.

Beware Of Altruism. It Is Based On Self-deception, The Root Of All Evil.

As It Says In Bible, God Fights On Side Of Heaviest Artillery.

Most Gods Have The Manners And Morals Of A Spoiled Child.

Only A Sadistic Scoundrel-or A Fool-tells The Bald Truth On Social Occasions.

I Think The Major Problem In Growing Up Is To Become Sophisticated Without Becoming Cynical.

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.

Whores Perform The Same Function As Priests, But Far More Thoroughly.

God Split Himself Into A Myriad Parts That He Might Have Friends. This May Not Be True, But It Sounds Good, And Is No Sillier Than Any Other Theology.

Spacemen Die If They Stay In One Place.

Free Will Is A Golden Thread Running Through The Frozen Matrix Of Fixed Events.

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

The Human Race Divides Politically Into Those Who Want People To Be Controlled And Those Who Have No Such Desire.

I Have Spent Too Much Of My Life Opening Doors For Cats—i Once Calculated That, Since The Dawn Of Civilization, Nine Hundred And Seventy-eight Man-centuries Have Been Used Up That Way. I Could Show You Figures.

Aside From A Cold Appreciation Of My Own Genius I Felt That I Was A Modest Man.

Limiting The Freedom Of News 'just A Little Bit' Is In The Same Category With The Classic Example 'a Little Bit Pregnant.

Never Force An Idea; You'll Abort It If You Do.

War Is Not Violence And Killing, Pure And Simple; War Is Controlled Violence, For A Purpose. The Purpose Of War Is To Support Your Government's Decisions By Force. The Purpose Is Never To Kill The Enemy Just To Be Killing Him But To Make Him Do What You Want Him To Do. Not Killing... But Controlled And Purposeful Violence.

But If You Didn't Have More Urgent Things To Do After Supper [in Boot Camp], You Could Write A Letter, Loaf, Gossip, Discuss The Myriad Mental Shortcomings Of Sergeants And, Dearest Of All, Talk About The Female Of The Species (we Became Convinced That There Was No Such Creatures, Just Mythology Created By Inflamed Imaginations - One Boy In Our Company Claimed To Have Seen A Girl, Over At Regimental Headquarters; He Was Unanimously Judged A Liar And A Braggart).

Around The Time Of The Terran Caesar Augustus, A Martian Artist Had Been Composing A Work Of Art. It Could Have Been Called A Poem, A Musical Opus, Or A Philosophical Treatise; It Was A Series Of Emotions Arranged In Tragic, Logical Necessity. Since It Could Be Experienced By A Human Only In The Sense In Which A Man Blind From Birth Might Have A Sunset Explained To Him, It Does Not Matter Which Category It Be Assigned.

Almost Everything About A Human Creature Is Ridiculous, Except Its Ability To Suffer Bravely And Die Gallantly For Whatever It Loves And Believes In. The Validity Of That Belief, The Appropriateness Of That Love, Is Irrelevant; It Is The Bravery And The Gallantry That Count.

Self Awareness Is Not Just A Bunch Of Amino Acids Bumping Together.

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.

A Child's Life Is Like A Piece Of Paper On Which Every Person Leaves A Mark.

I Have Never Been Able To See Life As Anything But A Vast Complicated Practical Joke, And It's Better To Laugh Than Cry.

Theology Is Never Any Help; It Is Searching In A Dark Cellar At Midnight For A Black Cat That Isn't There. Theologians Can Persuade Themselves Of Anything.

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

The Two Highest Achievements Of The Human Mind Are The Twin Concepts Of "loyalty" And "duty". Whenever These Twin Concepts Fall Into Disrepute, Get Out Of There Fast! You May Possibly Save Yourself, But It Is Too Late To Save That Society. It Is Doomed.

Peace Is An Extension Of War By Political Means. Plenty Of Elbow-room Is Pleasanter -- And Much Safer.

The Capacity Of The Human Mind For Swallowing Nonsense And Spewing It Forth In Violent And Repressive Action Has Never Yet Been Plumbed.

Die Trying" Is The Proudest Human Thing.

If I Had Found Out Anything, It Was That They Could Print It Faster Than I Could Study It.

I Counted To Ten Slowly, Using Binary Notation.

Many Short-sighted Fools Think That Going To The Moon Was Just A Stunt. But The Astronauts Knew The Meaning Of What They Were Doing, As Is Shown By Neil Armstrong's First Words In Stepping Down Onto The Soil Of Luna: "one Small Step For A Man, One Giant Leap For Mankind."

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

The Greatest Productive Force Is Human Selfishness.

Have You Ever Noticed How Much They Look Like Orchids? Lovely!

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...

By The Laws Of Statistics We Could Probably Approximate Just How Unlikely It Is That It Would Happen. But People Forget Especially Those Who Ought To Know Better, Such As Yourself That While The Laws Of Statistics Tell You How Unlikely A Particular Coincidence Is, They State Just As Firmly That Coincidences Do Happen.

Come Judgment Day, We May Find That Mumbo Jumbo The God Of The Congo Was The Big Boss All Along.

The Extremely Tiny Fraction Who Think Regularly, Accurately, Creatively, And Without Self-delusion - In The Long Run, These Are The Only People Who Count.

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

Never Appeal To A Man's 'better Nature.' He May Not Have One. Invoking His Self-interest Gives You More Leverage.

Your Enemy Is Never A Villain In His Own Eyes.

Specialization Is For Insects.

All Societies Are Based On Rules To Protect Pregnant Women And Young Children. All Else Is Surplusage, Excrescence, Adornment, Luxury, Or Folly Which Can - And Must - Be Dumped In Emergency To Preserve This Prime Function. As Racial Survival Is The Only Universal Morality, No Other Basic Is Possible. Attempts To Formulate A "perfect Society" On Any Foundation Other Than "women And Children First!" Is Not Only Witless, It Is Automatically Genocidal. Nevertheless, Starry-eyed Idealists (all Of Them Male) Have Tried Endlessly - And No Doubt Will Keep Trying.

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.

Certain Types Of Loudmouthism Should Be A Capital Offense Among Decent People.

I'm Always Suspicious Of Disinterested Interest.

Note The Individual And Subjective Nature Of Each Case. No Two Are Alike And There Is No Reason To Expect Them To Be. Each Man Or Woman Must Find For Himself Or Herself That Occupation In Which Hard Work And Long Hours Make Him Or Her Happy. Contrariwise, If You Are Looking For Shorter Hours And Longer Vacations And Early Retirement, You Are In The Wrong Job. Perhaps You Need To Take Up Bank Robbing. Or Geeking In A Sideshow. Or Even Politics.

'savage' Describes A Cultural Condition, Not A Degree Of Intelligence.

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

There Ought Not To Be Anything In The Whole Universe That Man Can't Poke His Nose Into-that's The Way We're Built And I Assume That There's Some Reason For That.

Whether The Authorities Be Invaders Or Merely Local Tyrants, The Effect Of Such [gun Control] Laws Is To Place The Individual At The Mercy Of The State, Unable To Resist.

Butterflies Are Self Propelled Flowers.

I See The Beauty Of Mike's Attempt To Devise An Ideal Ethic And Applaud His Recognition That Such Must Start By Junking The Present Sexual Code And Starting Fresh. Most Philosophers Haven't The Courage For This; They Swallow The Basics Of The Present Code--monogamy, Family Pattern, Continence, Body Taboos, Conventional Restrictions On Intercourse, And So Forth--then Fiddle With Details...even Such Piffle As Discussing Whether The Female Breast Is An Obscene Sight! (p.365)

I Believe That Almost All Politicians Are Honest. For Every Bribed Alderman There Are Hundreds Of Politicians, Low Paid Or Not Paid At All, Doing Their Level Best Without Thanks Or Glory To Make Our System Work. If This Were Not True, We Would Never Have Gotten Past The Thirteen Colonies.

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.

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

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.

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 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.

We Each Have A Moral Obligation To Conserve And Preserve Beauty In This World; There Is None To Waste.

Progress Isn't Made By Early Risers. It's Made By Lazy Men Trying To Find Easier Ways To Do Something.

A Long And Wicked Life Followed By Five Minutes Of Perfect Grace Gets You Into Heaven. An Equally Long Life Of Decent Living And Good Works Followed By One Outburst Of Taking The Name Of The Lord In Vain- Then Have A Heart Attack At That Moment And Be Damned For Eternity. Is That The System?

There Are Only Five Things Really Worth Drawing; Four Of Them Are Pretty Girls And The Fifth Is Cats.

But, Do You Know, Once You Get Used To It's Rather Cute. I Mean, If A Girl Looks Alright To Start With, She Still Looks Alright With Her Head Smooth.

Television Leaves No External Scars.

Government! Three Fourths Parasitic And The Other Fourth Stupid Fumbling.

Most Neuroses And Some Psychoses Can Be Traced To The Unnecessary And Unhealthy Habit Of Daily Wallowing In The Troubles And Sins Of Five Billion Strangers.

The Most Expensive Thing In The World Is A Second-best Military Establishment, Good But Not Good Enough To Win.

Anyone Who Clings To The Historically Untrue-and Thoroughly Immoral-doctrine That, 'violence Never Settles Anything' I Would Advise To Conjure The Ghosts Of Napoleon Bonaparte And The Duke Of Wellington And Let Them Debate It. The Ghost Of Hitler Could Referee, And The Jury Might Well Be The Dodo, The Great Auk And The Passenger Pigeon. Violence, Naked Force, Has Settled More Issues In History Than Has Any Other Factor, And The Contrary Opinion Is Wishful Thinking At Its Worst. Breeds That Forget This Basic Truth Have Always Paid For It With Their Lives And Freedom.

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

Secrecy Begets Tyranny.

Specialisation Is For Insects!

Morals - All Correct Moral Laws - Derive From The Instinct To Survive. Moral Behavior Is Survival Behavior Above The Individual Level.

It Would Take Centuries And He Must Grow And Grow And Grow, But He Was In No Hurry--he Grokked That Eternity And The Ever-beautifully-changing Now Were Identical.

Must Be Yearning Deep In Human Heart To Stop Other People From Doing As They Please.

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

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.

I Remembered A Time When My Grandmother Had Asked Me To Explain Television To Her - The Guts, Not The Funny Pictures. There Are Things Which Cannot Be Taught In Ten Easy Lessons, Nor Popularized For The Masses; They Take Years Of Skull Sweat. This Be Treason In An Age When Ignorance Has Come Into Its Own And One Man's Opinion Is As Good As Another's. But There It Is. As Star Says, The World Is What It Is - And Doesn't Forgive Ignorance.

Are You Trying To Tell All Of Us We Have A Bad Signal-to-noise Ratio?

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.

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

Being A Mother Is An Attitude, Not A Biological Relation.

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

How You Behave Toward Cats Here Below Determines Your Status In Heaven.

In A Mature Society, 'civil Servant' Is Semantically Equal To 'civil Master.'

Formal Courtesy Between Husband And Wife Is Even More Important Than It Is Between Strangers.

...a Book Need Never Die And Should Not Be Killed; Books Were The Immortal Part Of Man.

...revolutions Are Not Won By Enlisting The Masses. Revolution Is A Science For The Few Who Are Competent To Practice It. It Depends On Correct Organisation And Above All, On Communications.

Pessimist By Policy, Optimist By Temperament- It Is Possible To Be Both. How? By Never Taking An Unnecessary Chance And By Minimizing The Risks You Can't Avoid. This Permits You To Play Out The Game Untroubled By The Certainty Of The Outcome.

Social Responsibility Above The Level Of Family, Or At Most Of Tribe, Requires Imagination-- Devotion, Loyalty, All The Higher Virtues -- Which A Man Must Develop Himself; If He Has Them Forced Down Him, He Will Vomit Them Out.

Moving Parts In Rubbing Contact Require Lubrication To Avoid Excessive Wear. Honorifics And Formal Politeness Provide Lubrication Where People Rub Together. Often The Very Young, The Untravelled, The Naive, The Sophisticated Deplore These Formalities As 'empty,' 'meaningless,' Or 'dishonest,' And Scorn To Use Them. No Matter How 'pure' Their Motives, They Thereby Throw Sand Into Machinery That Does Not Work Too Well At Best.

If It Can't Be Expressed In Figures, It Is Not Science; It Is Opinion. It Has Long Been Known That One Horse Can Run Faster Than Another - But Which One? Differences Are Crucial.

It Is A Truism That Almost Any Sect, Cult, Or Religion Will Legislate Its Creeds Into Law If It Acquires The Political Power To Do So, And Will Follow It By Suppressing Opposition, Subverting All Education To Seize Early The Minds Of The Young, And By Killing, Locking Up, Or Driving Underground All Heretics.

Thou Art God, I Am God. All That Groks Is God.

Anything Free Is Worth What You Pay For It.

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.

I Believe In The Honest Craft Of Workmen.

If Satan Should Ever Replace God He Would Find It Necessary To Assume The Attributes Of Divinity.

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)

The Hardest Part About Gaining Any New Idea Is Sweeping Out The False Idea Occupying That Niche. As Long As That Niche Is Occupied, Evidence And Proof And Logical Demonstration Get Nowhere. But Once The Niche Is Emptied Of The Wrong Idea That Has Been Filling It:; Once You Can Honestly Say, "i Don't Know", Then It Becomes Possible To Get At The Truth.

Responsibility Cannot Be Shared.

Library Science Is The Key To All Science, Just As Mathematics Is Its Language - And Civilization Will Rise Or Fall, Depending On How Well Librarians Do Their Jobs.

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

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

You Don’t Pay Back, You Pay Forward.

Love Your Country, But Never Trust Its Government.

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.

Democracy Is Four Wolves And A Sheep Voting On Dinner.

Dad Claims That Library Science Is The Foundation Of All Sciences Just As Math Is The Key -- And We Will Survive Or Founder, Depending On How Well The Librarians Do Their Jobs. Librarians Didn't Look Glamorous To Me But Maybe Dad Had Hit On A Not Very Obvious Truth.

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

The Early Worm Deserves The Bird.

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.

The Second Best Thing About Space Travel Is That The Distances Involved Make War Very Difficult, Usually Impractical, And Almost Always Unnecessary. This Is Probably A Loss For Most People, Since War Is Our Race's Most Popular Diversion, One Which Gives Purpose And Color To Dull And Stupid Lives. But It Is A Great Boon To The Intelligent Man Who Fights Only When He Must-never For Sport.

Never Do Today What You Can Put Off Till Tomorrow If Tomorrow Might Improve The Odds.

The Way To Find Justice Is To Deal Fairly With Other People And Not Worry About How They Deal With You.

It Is Impossible For Anyone To Be Responsible For Another Person's Behavior. The Most You Or Any Leader Can Do Is To Encourage Each One To Be Responsible For Himself.

Following Your Own Path

Age Does Not Bring Wisdom... But It Does Give Perspective... And The Saddest Sight Of All Is To See, Far Behind You, Temptations You've Resisted.

If We Blow Ourselves Up We Will Do It By Misapplication Of Science; If We Manage To Keep From Blowing Ourselves Up, It Will Be Through Intelligent Application Of Science.

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

...i Am Opposed To All Attempts To License Or Restrict The Arming Of Individuals... I Consider Such Laws A Violation Of Civil Liberty, Subversive Of Democratic Political Institutions, And Self-defeating In Their Purpose.

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.

The Hardest Part Of Gaining Any New Idea Is Sweeping Out The False Idea Occupying That Niche.

It's Better To Copulate Than Not.

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

There Is No Conclusive Evidence Of Life After Death, But There Is No Evidence Of Any Sort Against It. Soon Enough You Will Know, So Why Fret About It?

Life After Death

I Do Know That The Slickest Way To Lie Is To Tell The Right Amount Of Truth--then Shut Up.

Take Big Bites. Anything Worth Doing Is Worth Overdoing.

Anything Worth Doing

Damnit! Nationalism Should Stop At The Stratosphere!

I Had Taken A Partner Once Before—but, Damnation, No Matter How Many Times You Get Your Fingers Burned, You Have To Trust People. Otherwise You Are A Hermit In A Cave, Sleeping With One Eye Open.

The Difference Between Science And The Fuzzy Subjects Is That Science Requires Reasoning While Those Other Subjects Merely Require Scholarship.

Stupidity Is The Only Natural Capital Offense.

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

Finish What You Start. Keep Submitting Until It Sells.

The Most Noble Fate A Man Can Endure Is To Place His Own Mortal Body Between His Loved Home And The War's Desolation.

Anything Which Is Physically Possible Can Always Be Made Financially Possible; Money Is A Bugaboo Of Small Minds.

The Police Of A State Should Never Be Stronger Or Better Armed Than The Citizenry. An Armed Citizenry, Willing To Fight, Is The Foundation Of Civil Freedom. That's A Personal Evaluation, Of Course.

A Monarch's Neck Should Always Have A Noose Around It. It Keeps Him Upright.

His Was Not A Small Mind Bothered By Logic And Consistency.

A Motion To Adjourn Is Always In Order.

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

Nor Would Anybody Suspect. If Was One Thing All People Took For Granted, Was Conviction That If You Feed Honest Figures Into A Computer, Honest Figures Come Out. Never Doubted It Myself Till I Met A Computer With A Sense Of Humor.

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.

Don't Explain Computers To Laymen. Simpler To Explain Sex To A Virgin.

If Possible, Leave Room For Your Enemy To Become Your Friend.

Never Trust Machinery More Complicated Than A Knife And Fork.

I've Never Understood How God Could Expect His Creatures To Pick The One True Religion By Faith-it Strikes Me As A Sloppy Way To Run A Universe.

Belief Gets In The Way Of Learning.

It Is Said That God Notes Each Sparrow That Falls. And So He Does. But The Proper Closest Statement Of It That Can Be Made In English Is That God Cannot Avoid Noting The Sparrow Because The Sparrow Is God. And When A Cat Stalks A Sparrow Both Of Them Are God, Carrying Out God's Thoughts.

History Is Never Surprising After It Happens.

Selfishness Is The Bedrock On Which All Moral Behavior Starts And It Can Be Immoral Only When It Conflicts With A Higher Moral Imperative.

Son, The Phrase Is Self-contradictory; "sense" Is Never "common".

How Anybody Expects A Man To Stay In Business With Every Two-bit Wowser In The Country Claiming A Veto Over What We Can Say And Can't Say And What We Can Show And What We Can't Show - It's Enough To Make You Throw Up. The Whole Principle Is Wrong; It's Like Demanding That Grown Men Live On Skim Milk Because The Baby Can't Eat Steak.

Work Is Not An End In Itself; There Must Always Be Time Enough For Love.

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