“When you trip over love, it is easy to get up. But when you fall in love, it is impossible to stand again.”

“Rejoice with your family in the beautiful land of life.”

“The tendencies we have mentioned are something new for America. They arose when, under the influence of the two World Wars and the consequent concentration of all forces on a military goal, a predominantly military mentality developed, which with the almost sudden victory became even more accentuated. The characteristic feature of this mentality is that people place the importance of what Bertrand Russell so tellingly terms “naked power” far above all other factors which affect the relations between peoples. The Germans, misled by Bismarck’s successes in particular, underwent just such a transformation of their mentality—in consequence of which they were entirely ruined in less than a hundred years. I must frankly confess that the foreign policy of the United States since the termination of hostilities has reminded me, sometimes irresistibly, of the attitude of Germany under Kaiser Wilhelm II, and I know that, independent of me, this analogy has most painfully occurred to others as well. It is characteristic of the military mentality that non-human factors (atom bombs, strategic bases, weapons of all sorts, the possession of raw materials, etc.) are held essential, while the human being, his desires and thoughts—in short, the psychological factors—are considered as unimportant and secondary. Herein lies a certain resemblance to Marxism, at least insofar as its theoretical side alone is kept in view. The individual is degraded to a mere instrument; he becomes “human materiel.” The normal ends of human aspiration vanish with such a viewpoint. Instead, the military mentality raises “naked power” as a goal in itself—one of the strangest illusions to which men can succumb.”

“The more I learn, the more I realize how much I don't know.”

“As long as armies exist, any serious quarrel will lead to war.”

“Come si può mettere la Nona di Beethoven in un diagramma cartesiano? Ci sono delle realtà che non sono quantificabili. L'universo non è i miei numeri: è pervaso tutto dal mistero. Chi non ha il senso del mistero è un uomo mezzo morto.”

“No, this trick won't work... How on earth are you ever going to explain in terms of chemistry and physics so important a biological phenomenon as first love? ”

“When I was young I found out that the big toe always ends up making a hole in a sock. So I stopped wearing socks.”

“If at first the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it.”

“All generalizations are false, including this one.”

“The pursuit of truth and beauty is a sphere of activity in which we are permitted to remain children all our lives.”

“Communities tend to be guided less than individuals by conscience and a sense of responsibility. How much misery does this fact cause mankind! It is the source of wars and every kind of oppression, which fill the earth with pain, sighs and bitterness.”

“The world is a dangerous place to live, not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don't do anything about it.”

“I know quite certainly that I myself have no special talent; curiosity, obsession and dogged endurance, combined with self-criticism, have brought me to my ideas.”

“On the occasion of Mahatma Gandhi's 70th birthday. "Generations to come, it may well be, will scarce believe that such a man as this one ever in flesh and blood walked upon this Earth.”