Does a population have informed consent when that population is not taught the inner workings of its monetary system, and then is drawn, all unknowing, into economic adventures?

A popular man arouses the jealousy of the powerful.

Then, as his planet killed him, it occurred to Kynes that his father and all the other scientists were wrong, that the most persistent principles of the universe were accident and error.

There is a fundamental tension between science and freedom – no matter how science is viewed by its practitioners nor how freedom is sensed by those who believe they have it.

But one learns from books and reels only that certain things can be done. Actual learning requires that you do those things.

A killer with the manners of a rabbit – this is the most dangerous kind.

The price we paid was the price men have always paid for achieving a paradise in this life–we went soft, we lost our edge.

In 1054, the patriarch of Constantinople and the pope excommunicated each other. That was the end of holiness for both churches.

Life isn’t a problem to be solved. But a reality to be experienced.

I am a leg of the death tripod that will destroy our foes.

Since every individual is accountable ultimately to the self, the formation of that self demands our utmost care and attention.

My father once told me that respect for truth comes close to being the basis for all morality. ‘Something cannot emerge from nothing,’ he said. This is profound thinking if you understand how unstable ‘the...

Absolute power does not corrupt absolutely, absolute power attracts the corruptible.

This myth he’d made out of intricate movements and imagination, out of moonlight and love, out of prayers older than Adam, and gray cliffs and crimson shadows, laments and rivers of martyrs – what had...

The vision of time is broad, but when you pass through it, time becomes a narrow door.’ And always, he fought the temptation to choose a clear, safe course, warning, ‘That path leads ever down...

But, later, coming back and reading what I have produced, I am unable to detect the difference between what came easily and when I had to sit down and say, “Well, now it’s writing time...

To Suspect your Own Mortality is to Know the Beginning of Terror; To Learn Irrefutably that you are mortal is to Know the End of Terror.

Don’t give over all of your critical faculties to people in power, no matter how admirable those people may appear to be. Beneath the hero’s facade you will find a human being who makes human...

These are illusions of popular history which successful religion must promote: Evil men never prosper; only the brave deserve the fair; honesty is the best policy; actions speak louder than words; virtue always triumpths; a...

Most civilisation is based on cowardice. It’s so easy to civilize by teaching cowardice. You water down the standards which would lead to bravery. You restrain the will. You regulate the appetites. You fence in...

Religion, too, is a weapon. What manner of weapon is religion when it becomes the government?

Scientists seek the lawfulness of events. It is the task of Religion to fit man into this lawfulness.

Every civilization depends on the quality of the individuals it produces. If you over-organize humans, over-legalize them, suppress their urge to greatness– they cannot work and their civilization collapses

I don’t speak, I operate a machine called language. It creaks and groans, but is mine own.

Seek freedom and become captive of your desires. Seek discipline and find your liberty.

We accept too damned many things on the explanations of people who could have good reasons for lying.

Grave this on your memory, lad: A world is supported by four things…” she held up four big-knuckled fingers. “…the learning of the wise, the justice of the great, the prayers of the righteous and...

And your hands are the right ones?

This wise man observed that wealth is a tool of freedom. But the pursuit of wealth is the way to slavery.

Piter: Ah-ah, Baron! Is it not regrettable you were unable to devise this delicious scheme by yourself?Baron: Someday I will have you strangled, Piter.Piter: Of a certainty, Baron. Enfin! But a kind act is never...

There is no real ending. It’s just the place where you stop the story.

Give as few orders as possible,” his father had told him once long ago. “Once you’ve given orders on a subject, you must always give orders on that subject.

My Uncle Malky always said the Lord Leto never responded to prayer. He said the Lord Leto looked on prayer as attempted coercion, a form of violence against the chosen god, telling the immortal what...

Greatness is a transitory experience. It is never consistent. It depends in part upon the myth-making imagination of humankind. The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he is in. He...

What has mood to do with it? You fight when the necessity arises—no matter the mood! Mood’s a thing for cattle or making love or playing the baliset. It’s not for fighting.

Some say,” Scytale said, “that people cling to Imperial leadership because space is infinite. They feel lonely without a unifying symbol. For a lonely people, the Emperor is a definite place. They can turn toward...

To exist is to stand out, away from the background,” The Preacher said. “You aren’t thinking or really existing unless you’re willing to risk even your own sanity in the judgment of your existence.

It has occurred to me more than once that holy boredom is good and sufficient reason for the invention of free will.

To claim absolute knowledge is to become monstrous. Knowledge is an unending adventure at the edge of uncertainty.

Governments, if they endure, always tend increasingly toward aristocratic forms. No government in history has been known to evade this pattern. And as the aristocracy develops, government tends more and more to act exclusively in...

Empires do not suffer emptiness of purpose at the time of their creation. It is when they have become established that aims are lost and replaced by vague ritual.

One of the key characteristics of an elite corps is its susceptibility to those more powerful than itself. Elite power is naturally attracted to a power hierarchy and fits itself neatly, obediently into the one...

Ce anume disprețuiești? Așa poți fi cunoscut cu adevărat.

And loyalty is a valued commodity. It can be sold . . . not bought, but sold.

The gift of words is the gift of deception and illusion.

Conducătorul este unul dintre factorii care creează deosebirea dintre o gloată și un popor. Conducătorul trebuie să mențină nivelul indivizilor. Prea puțini indivizi… și un popor degenerează în gloată.

Dangers lurk in all systems. Systems incorporate the unexamined beliefs of their creators. Adopt a system, accept its beliefs, and you help strengthen the resistance to change

Humans are almost always lonely.

Highly organized research is guaranteed to produce nothing new.

We have a disturbed relationship with our past which religion cannot explain. We are primitive in unexplainable ways, our lives woven of the familiar and the strange, the reasonable and the insane.