You must consciously choose what you know. Knowledge fromthis present social system is notdesigned to help you succeed.

It is better to know so much about a few but important things, than to know so little about life, and much about trivial things.

The quality of knowledge youbring into the relationshipdetermines the quality of therelationship.

Knowledge is what you know, that gives you an edge overthe ordinary person.

It is better to be a Number Two in a working system, than be a Number One yet lack capacity to make the system work.

Mathematics is life: the workings (process) is more important than the answer (proof/product). A wrong process cannot make a right product.

The will is your most important asset. If you lose it, you have lost everything.

With mathematics we stand precisely at that intersection of bondage and freedom that is the essence of the human itself.

I still do not understand why some people think they mean nothing to anyone

Newspapers have developed what might be called a vested interest in catastrophe. If they can spot a fight they play up that fight. If they can uncover a tragedy they will headline that tragedy.

I am a father, I am very aware of the things that I'm putting out in the world knowing that one day my children will watch the work that I've done. I want to be able to stand by it.

The simple rely on a bolstering mass of maxim and precept, so do the timid, so do the mentally lazy – and so do all of us, more than we imagine.

The simple secret is this: put your trust in the Lord, do your best, then leave the rest to Him.

I grew up in Ohio, and I was a musicologist since I was little; it is all that I would ever read.

Though the fact that they have to be rebuilt And frequently mortgaged to the hilt Is inclined to take the gilt Off the gingerbread, And certainly damps the fun Of the eldest son.

The effects of infantile instruction are, like those of syphilis, never completely cured.

It's difficult to talk to people who whisper even at home, afraid of Americans eavesdropping on them. It's not a figure of speech, not a joke, I'm serious.