Russell, Bertrand

"The wise are merciful to those they oppose."

"Happiness is not best achieved by those who seek it directly."

"Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind."

"It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents us from living freely and nobly."

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

"Every great intellectual effort is first ridiculed, then rejected, then taken for granted."

"Do not feel envious of the happiness of those who live in a fool's paradise, for only a fool will think that it is happiness."

"The infliction of cruelty with a good conscience is a delight to moralists. That is why they invented hell."

"The demand for the creation of jobs demands that we should ever increase production; that is to say, we should steadily increase our consumption."

"Freedom in general may be defined as the absence of obstacles to the realization of desires."

"One of the most powerful forces in human nature is the tendency to believe what we have been told by those whom we were taught to respect and to love."

"The verb to love is perhaps the most important verb in human experience."

"In all affairs it's a healthy thing now and then to hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted."

"Machines encumber us. We are in danger of becoming the servants of our servants."

"The greatest challenge to any thinker is stating the problem in a way that will allow a solution."

"The belief that peace is better than war must govern our relations with other nations."

"Do not assume that he who seeks to comfort you now, lives untroubled among the simple and quiet words that cover your grief."

"A little learning is a dangerous thing, but a lot of ignorance is just as bad."

"I have never felt surer that a thing was true than I have about the proposition that 2+2=4, yet I have come to learn that mathematics as a whole cannot be said to be known with certainty."

"It is a waste of energy to be angry with a man who behaves badly, just as it is to be angry with a car that will not go."

"Those who have never known the deep satisfaction of doing something they believe is worth doing will never know the deep despair of failure."

"The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt."

"Most people would sooner die than think; in fact, they do so."

"It is a pity that when one hates a man, one is sometimes obliged to admire his wife."

"Fear is the main source of superstition, and one of the main sources of cruelty."

"The savage bows down to idols of wood and stone; the civilized man bows down to idols of flesh and blood."

"Work is of two kinds: first, altering the position of matter at or near the Earth's surface; second, telling other people to do so."

"Even if the open windows of science at first make us shiver after the cozy indoor warmth of traditional myths, in the end the fresh air brings vigor, and the great spaces have a splendor of their own."

"To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom."

"Do not fear to be thought radical; history vindicates the radical."