Your writing is never as good as you hoped; but never as bad as you feared.

The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge.

The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts.

The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.

Fear is the main source of superstition, and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom.

Men are born ignorant, not stupid. They are made stupid by education.

An Honest politician will not be tolerated by a democracy unless he is very stupid ... because only a very stupid man can honestly share the prejudices of more than half the nation.

If there were in the world today any large number of people who desired their own happiness more than they desired the unhappiness of others, we could have a paradise in a few years.

We have in fact, two kinds of morality, side by side: one which we preach, but do not practice, and another which we practice, but seldom preach.

The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd.

Cruel men believe in a cruel god and use their belief to excuse their cruelty. Only kindly men believe in a kindly god, and they would be kindly in any case.

A country road, a gravel road, is a sign of civilization, sure, but it’s just a farm, an easy conquest. Iron means a stronghold, people who can defend what’s theirs.

I need a friend and you seemed nicest. I think you and I can have more fun than those fake people on the other side.

For God's sake let us freely hear both sides!

We may never understand what leads anybody to terrorize their fellow human beings. Such violence, such evil is senseless. It's beyond reason.

I'm never going to tell the reader what to believe; I'm going to examine these characters that believe different ways, and examine their motives.

I am a member of the London Library, and on almost every single job I do, there is some benefit to be had in going there and pulling two or three books off the shelves.

There will be no going back to the era before September the 11th, 2001 - to false comfort in a dangerous world.

I was looking at a bottle of water; they have nutritional facts printed on the side. You know, I'm no chemist, but I have a rough idea what's in water.

The extra pass and the extra effort on defense always get the job done.

Violence doesn't have a race, a class, a religion, or a nationality, but it does have a gender.