I am accustomed to sleep and in my dreams to imagine the same things that lunatics imagine when awake.

I am accustomed to sleep and in my dreams to imagine the same things that lunatics imagine when awake.

The inertia of the human mind and its resistance to innovation are most clearly demonstrated not, as one might expect, read more

The inertia of the human mind and its resistance to innovation are most clearly demonstrated not, as one might expect, by the ignorant mass- which is easily swayed once its imagination is caught- but by professionals with a vested interest in tradition and in the monopoly of learning. Innovation is a twofold threat to academic mediocrities: it endangers their oracular authority, and it evokes the deeper fear that their whole, laboriously constructed intellectual edifice might collapse. The academic backwoodsmen have been the curse of genius from Aristarchus to Darwin and Freud; they stretch, a solid and hostile phalanx of pedantic mediocrities, across the centuries.

A fool hath no dialogue within himself, the first thought carrieth him without the reply of a second.

A fool hath no dialogue within himself, the first thought carrieth him without the reply of a second.

If your dream is a big dream, and if you want your life to work on the high level that read more

If your dream is a big dream, and if you want your life to work on the high level that you say you do, there's no way around doing the work it takes to get you there.

It seems, in fact, as though the second half of a man's life is made up of nothing, but the read more

It seems, in fact, as though the second half of a man's life is made up of nothing, but the habits he has accumulated during the first half.

The first step in freeing yourself from social restrictions is the realization that there is no such thing as a read more

The first step in freeing yourself from social restrictions is the realization that there is no such thing as a "safe" code of conduct - one that would earn everyone's approval. Your actions can always be condemned by someone - for being too bold or too apathetic, for being too conformist or too nonconformist, for being too liberal or too conservative. So it's necessary to decide whose approval is important to you.

A nail is driven out by another nail. Habit is overcome by habit.

A nail is driven out by another nail. Habit is overcome by habit.

The prerequisite of originality is the art of forgetting, at the proper moment, what we know.

The prerequisite of originality is the art of forgetting, at the proper moment, what we know.

There is no reason why humanity cannot be served equally by weighty and trivial motives.

There is no reason why humanity cannot be served equally by weighty and trivial motives.