Perfection is a trifle dull. It is not the least of life's ironies that this, which we all aim at, is better not quite achieved.

In idleness there is a perpetual despair

Thomas Carlyle

Humor is not a postscript or an incidental afterthought; it is a serious and weighty part of the world's economy. One feels increasingly the height of the faculty in which it arises, the nobility of things associated with it, and the greatness of services it renders.

Oscar W. Firkins, Oscar Firkins:

Individuality is founded in feeling and the recesses of feeling, the darker, blinder strata of character, are the only places in the world in which we catch real fact in the making, and directly perceive how events happen, and how work is actually done.

William James

But just as delicate fare does not stop you from craving for saveloys, so tried and exquisite friendship does not take away your taste for something new and dubious.

Sidonie Gabrielle Colette

Protein, so far as we know, does not replicate itself all by itself, not on this planet anyway. Looked at this way, the [prion] seems the strangest thing in all biology, and, until someone in some laboratory figures out what it is, a candidate for Modern Wonder. (quote originally by Lewis Thomas)

D.T. Max

As human beings, we are vulnerable to confusing the unprecedented with the improbable. In our everyday experience, if something has never happened before, we are generally safe in assuming it is not going to happen in the future, but the exceptions can kill you and climate change is one of those exceptions.

Al Gore

On the horizon, he saw the full moon. God dropped it there, he was sure, as a reminder of our small place in the world. A reminder that what is beautiful is fleeting.

Ben Sherwood

I cannot think of anything more difficult than to say something which would be worthy of this impressive and, for me, memorable occasion, and of the ideals and purposes which inspired the Nobel Peace Award.

Lester B. Pearson

In Australia, they set up a special fund to kick films off. It was quite an enlightened sort of move. You could go to this government bureau with scripts and and get finance for films.

Bruce Beresford

The degree in which a poet's imagination dominates reality is, in the end, the exact measure of his importance and dignity.

George Santayana

The sun rose slowly, as if it wasn't sure it was worth all the effort.

Terry Pratchett

The easiest thing to do, whenever you fail, is to put yourself down by blaming your lack of ability for your misfortunes.

Kenneth Hildebrand