“The difference between real material poison and intellectual poison is that most material poison is disgusting to the taste, but intellectual poison, which takes the form of cheap newspapers or bad books, can unfortunately sometimes be attractive.”

“Let every American, every lover of liberty, every well wisher to his posterity, swear by the blood of the Revolution, never to violate in the least particular, the laws of the country; and never to tolerate their violation by others.”

“I have read the last page of the Bible. It is all going to turn out all right.”

“If you prayed as much as you complain and quarrel, you'd have a lot less to argue about and much more peace of mind.” 

“Goals are the fuel in the furnace of achievement”

“You cannot afford to suggest to another person, by word of mouth or in writing, or through any act, that which you yourself do not believe.”

“There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it.”

“...the role of the disappointed lover of a maiden or of any single woman might be ridiculous; but the role of a man who was pursuing a married woman, and who made it the purpose of his life at all cost to draw her into adultery, was one which had in it something beautiful and dignified and could never be ridiculous....”

“Airplane travel is nature's way of making you look like your passport photo.”

“We must either learn to live together as brothers, or we are going to die together as fools.”

“Ships and railways do not spring up from the earth and function automatically. They come in response to the call of civilisation, through the labour and ingenuity and organising ability of people who have imagination, faith, enthusiasm, decision and persistence! These people are known as capitalists. They are motivated by the desire to build, construct, achieve, provide useful service, earn profits and accumulate riches. And, because they provide service without which there would be no civilisation, they put themselves in the way of great riches.”

“Focusing your life solely on making a buck shows a poverty of ambition. It asks too little of yourself. And it will leave you unfulfilled.”

“Quietly endure, silently suffer and patiently wait.”

“Mainly, though, the Democratic Party has become the party of reaction. In reaction to a war that is ill conceived, we appear suspicious of all military action. In reaction to those who proclaim the market can cure all ills, we resist efforts to use market principles to tackle pressing problems. In reaction to religious overreach, we equate tolerance with secularism, and forfeit the moral language that would help infuse our policies with a larger meaning. We lose elections and hope for the courts to foil Republican plans. We lost the courts and wait for a White House scandal. And increasingly we feel the need to match the Republican right in stridency and hardball tactics. The accepted wisdom that drives many advocacy groups and Democratic activists these days goes like this: The Republican Party has been able to consistently win elections not by expanding its base but by vilifying Democrats, driving wedges into the electorate, energizing its right wing, and disciplining those who stray from the party line. If the Democrats ever want to get back into power, then they will have to take up the same approach. ...Ultimately, though, I believe any attempt by Democrats to pursue a more sharply partisan and ideological strategy misapprehends the moment we're in. I am convinced that whenever we exaggerate or demonize, oversimplify or overstate our case, we lose. Whenever we dumb down the political debate, we lose. For it's precisely the pursuit of ideological purity, the rigid orthodoxy and the sheer predictability of our current political debate, that keeps us from finding new ways to meet the challenges we face as a country. It's what keeps us locked in "either/or" thinking: the notion that we can have only big government or no government; the assumption that we must either tolerate forty-six million without health insurance or embrace "socialized medicine". It is such doctrinaire thinking and stark partisanship that have turned Americans off of politics. ”

“To invent something, all you need is imagination and a big pile of junk.”