Albert Einstein

Reading, after a certain age, diverts the mind too much from its creative pursuits. Any man who reads too much and uses his own brain too little falls into lazy habits of thinking.

The road to perdition has ever been accompanied by lip service to an ideal.

One may say the eternal mystery of the world is its comprehensibility.

To the Master's honor all must turn, each in its track, without a sound, forever tracing Newton's ground.

One strength of the communist system of the East is that it has some of the character of a religion and inspires the emotions of a religion.

The faster you go, the shorter you are.

I shall never believe that God plays dice with the world.

Isn't it strange that I who have written only unpopular books should be such a popular fellow?

The process of scientific discovery is, in effect, a continual flight from wonder.

I think and think for months and years. Ninety-nine times, the conclusion is false. The hundredth time I am right.

That deep emotional conviction of the presence of a superior reasoning power, which is revealed in the incomprehensible universe, forms my idea of God.

I have just got a new theory of eternity.

Sometimes one pays most for the things one gets for nothing.

Solitude is painful when one is young, but delightful when one is more mature.

I cannot imagine a God who rewards and punishes the objects of his creation and is but a reflection of human frailty.

There could be no fairer destiny for any physical theory than that it should point the way to a more comprehensive theory in which it lives on as a limiting case.

We should take care not to make the intellect our goal; it has, of course, powerful muscles, but no personality.

You ask me if I keep a notebook to record my great ideas. I've only ever had one.

If I were not a physicist, I would probably be a musician. I often think in music. I live my daydreams in music. I see my life in terms of music.

Small is the number of people who see with their eyes and think with their minds.

I used to go away for weeks in a state of confusion.

It is only to the individual that a soul is given.

We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if mankind is to survive.

The man of science is a poor philosopher.

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

True religion is real living; living with all one's soul, with all one's goodness and righteousness.

Let every man be respected as an individual and no man idolized.

The devil has put a penalty on all things we enjoy in life. Either we suffer in health or we suffer in soul or we get fat.

Few are those who see with their own eyes and feel with their own hearts.

All these primary impulses, not easily described in words, are the springs of man's actions.

Never lose a holy curiosity.

The only real valuable thing is intuition.

Confusion of goals and perfection of means seems, in my opinion, to characterize our age.

An empty stomach is not a good political adviser.

Put your hand on a hot stove for a minute and it seems like an hour. Sit with a pretty girl for an hour, and it seems like a minute.

As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain, and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality.

God may be subtle, but he isn't plain mean.

To raise new questions, new possibilities, to regard old problems from a new angle, requires creative imagination and marks real advance in science.

It was the experience of mystery - even if mixed with fear - that engendered religion.

Most of the fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple, and may, as a rule, be expressed in a language comprehensible to everyone.

The most incomprehensible thing about the world is that it is comprehensible.

My religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble mind.

You can never solve a problem on the level on which it was created.

There comes a time when the mind takes a higher plane of knowledge but can never prove how it got there.

Too many of us look upon Americans as dollar chasers. This is a cruel libel, even if it is reiterated thoughtlessly by the Americans themselves.

It should be possible to explain the laws of physics to a barmaid.

As far as I'm concerned, I prefer silent vice to ostentatious virtue.

Anger dwells only in the bosom of fools.

Morality is of the highest importance - but for us, not for God.

Never do anything against conscience even if the state demands it.