Society and the World

America is great because America is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.

Such a land [British Columbia] is good for an energetic man. It is also not so bad for the loafer.

The saving grace of America lies in the fact that the overwhelming majority of Americans are possessed of two great qualities—a sense of humor and a sense of proportion.

What is the use of a house if you haven’t got a tolerable planet to put it on?

The universe is not required to be in perfect harmony with human ambition.

Wherever you see a successful business, someone once made a courageous decision.

As a general rule, the most successful man in life is the man who has the best information.

Showing up is 80 percent of life.

Don’t wait around for other people to be happy for you. Any happiness you get you’ve got to make yourself.

Men hate those to whom they have to lie.

I seem to have been like a child playing on the sea shore, finding now and then a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay undiscovered before me.

The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science.

It is good enough to talk of God while we are sitting here after a nice breakfast and looking forward to a nicer luncheon, but how am I to talk of God to the millions who have to go without two meals a day? To them God can only appear as bread and butter.

In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who don’t.

Science is not only compatible with spirituality; it is a profound source of spirituality.

The true idealist pursues what his heart says is right in a way that his head says will work.

There is a sufficiency in the world for man’s need but not for man’s greed.

There is a sufficiency in the world for man’s need but not for man’s greed.

He does not seem to me to be a free man who does not sometimes do nothing.

Besides the noble art of getting things done, there is the noble art of leaving things undone. The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of non-essentials.

Man creates culture and through culture creates himself.

When you take stuff from one writer, it’s plagiarism; but when you take it from many writers it’s research.

Wherever they burn books they will also, in the end, burn human beings.

You don’t have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.