Kindle Notes & Highlights
Always listen to experts. They’ll tell you what can’t be done, and why. Then do it.
Certainly the game is rigged. Don’t let that stop you; if you don’t bet you can’t win.
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?
One man’s theology is another man’s belly laugh.
Throughout history, poverty is the normal condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded—here and there, now and then—are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty. This is known as bad luck.
History does not record anywhere at any time a religion that has any rational basis. Religion is a crutch for people not strong enough to stand up to the unknown without help. But, like dandruff, most people do have a religion and spend time and money on it and seem to derive considerable pleasure from fiddling with it.
Everything in excess! To enjoy the flavor of life, take big bites. Moderation is for monks.
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!
Moving parts in rubbing contact require lubrication to void excessive wear. Honorifics and formal politeness provide lubrication where people rub together. Often the very young, the untraveled, the naïve, the unsophisticated 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.
The first time I was a drill instructor I was too inexperienced for the job—the things I taught those lads must have got some of them killed. War is too serious a matter to be taught by the inexperienced.
You live and learn. Or you don’t live long.
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.
To stay young requires increasing cultivation of the ability to unlearn old falsehoods.
To be “matter of fact” about the world is to blunder into fantasy—and dull fantasy at that, as the real world is strange and wonderful.
Secrecy is the beginning of tyranny.
The more you love, the more you can love and the more intensely you love. Nor is there any limit on how many you can love. If a person had time enough, he could love all of that majority who are decent and just.
If “everybody knows” such-and-such, then it ain’t so, by at least ten thousand to one.
Sin lies only in hurting other people unnecessarily. All other “sins” are invented nonsense. (Hurting yourself is not sinful—just stupid.)
Climate is what we expect, weather is what we get.
