A spirit of national masochism prevails, encouraged by an effete corps of impudent snobs who characterize themselves as intellectuals.

Evil being the root of mystery, pain is the root of knowledge.

I am a part of everything that I have read.

A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. So is a lot.

Books are as useful to a stupid person as a mirror is useful to a blind person.

Make it a rule never to give a child a book you would not read yourself.

A thought is an idea in transit.

Physics is like sex: sure, it may give some practical results, but that's not why we do it.

It is what you read when you don't have to that determines what you will be when you can't help it.

With educated people, I suppose, punctuation is a matter of rule; with me it is a matter of feeling. But I must say I have great respect for the semi-colon; it's a useful little chap.

It isn't what we don't know that gives us trouble, it's what we know that ain't so.

Learning never exhausts the mind.

Better know nothing than half-know many things.

A child miseducated is a child lost.

It is not enough for the teacher to love the child. She must first love and understand the universe. She must prepare herself, and truly work at it.

In mathematics you don't understand things. You just get used to them.

Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel.

Medicine is my lawful wife and literature my mistress; when I get tired of one, I spend the night with the other.

The highest result of education is tolerance.

The most savage controversies are those about matters as to which there is no good evidence either way.

I learned very early the difference between knowing the name of something and knowing something.