“To dwell on the things that depress or anger us does not help in overcoming them. One must knock them down alone.”

“Failure is success in progress”

“Intelligent life on other planets? I'm not even sure there is on earth!”

“A man's actions are determined by necessity, external and internal.”

“Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.”

“The measure of intelligence is the ability to change.”

“When Albert Einstein was asked what he would really like to know about the Universe he replied,'is it friendly?”

“A society's competitive advantage will come not from how well its schools teach the multiplication and periodic tables, but from how well they stimulate imagination and creativity.”

“Knowledge of what is does not open the door directly to what should be.”

“Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune, intoned in the distance by an invisible piper.”

“Everyone must become their own person, however frightful that may be.”

“Don't do anything that goes against your conscience, even if your country says so.”

“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.”

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

“Striving for social justice is the most valuable thing to do in life.”