Quotes

One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We're no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It's simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we've been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back

Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds

One must give value to their existence by behaving as if one's very existence were a work of art

I would rather have questions that can't be answered than answers that can't be questioned

All of our inventions are but an improved means to an unimproved end

Man is potentially a rational being

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

Our death belongs only to us. This is my definition of freedom

There is not, I think, an instance of any large idea about the world being independently generated by religion

Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything he does

What is life but an unpleasant interruption to a peaceful nonexistence

If you want me to believe in your redeemer, you are going to have to look a lot more redeemed

Nobody can build the bridge for you to walk across the river of life, no one but you yourself alone. There are, to be sure, countless paths and bridges and demi-gods which would carry you across this river; but only at the cost of yourself; you would pawn yourself and lose. There is in the world only one way, on which nobody can go, except you: where does it lead? Do not ask, go along with it

They muddy the water, to make it seem deep

A man has as many social selves as there are distinct groups of persons about whose opinion he cares. He generally shows a different side of himself to each of these different groups