The happiest people seem to be those who have no particular reason for being happy except that they are so.

We have enslaved the rest of the animal creation, and have treated our distant cousins in fur and feathers so badly that beyond doubt, if they were able to formulate a religion, they would depict the Devil in human form.

The aim of education is the knowledge not of facts but of values.

The fruit of the tree of knowledge always drives man from some paradise or other; and even the paradise of fools is not an unpleasant abode while it is habitable.

The whole of nature, as has been said, is a conjugation of the verb to eat, in the active and passive.

Admiration for ourselves and our institutions is too often measured by our contempt and dislike for foreigners.

Each generation takes a special pleasure in removing the household gods of its parents from their pedestals, and consigning them to the cupboard.

A good government remains the greatest of human blessings, and no nation has ever enjoyed it.

In imperialism nothing fails like success. If the conqueror oppresses his subjects, they will become fanatical patriots, and sooner or later have their revenge; if he treats them well, and "governs them for their good," they will multiply faster than their rulers, till they claim their independence.

Every institution not only carries within it the seeds of its own dissolution, but prepares the way for its most hated rival.