It takes a kind of shabby arrogance to survive in our time, and a fairly romantic nature to want to.

It takes a kind of shabby arrogance to survive in our time, and a fairly romantic nature to want to.

If a walker is indeed an individualist there is nowhere he can't go at dawn and not many places he read more

If a walker is indeed an individualist there is nowhere he can't go at dawn and not many places he can't go at noon. But just as it demeans life to live alongside a great river you can no longer swim in or drink from, to be crowded into safer areas and hours takes much of the gloss off walking -- one sport you shouldn't have to reserve a time and a court for.

Yet we can maintain a free society only if we recognize that in a free society no one can win read more

Yet we can maintain a free society only if we recognize that in a free society no one can win all the time. No one can have his own way all the time, and no one is right all the time.

I like nonsense -- it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living. It's a way read more

I like nonsense -- it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living. It's a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope...and that enables you to laugh at all of life's realities.

What difference is there, do you think, between those in Plato's cave who can only marvel at the shadows and read more

What difference is there, do you think, between those in Plato's cave who can only marvel at the shadows and images of various objects, provided they are content and don't know what they miss, and the philosopher who has emerged from the cave and sees the real things?

We hear about constitutional rights, free speech and the free press. Every time I hear those words I say to read more

We hear about constitutional rights, free speech and the free press. Every time I hear those words I say to myself, "That man is a Red, that man is a Communist." You never heard a real American talk in that manner.

Virtue is not the absense of vices or the avoidance of moral dangers; virtue is a vivid and separate ting, read more

Virtue is not the absense of vices or the avoidance of moral dangers; virtue is a vivid and separate ting, like pain or a particular smell. - Tremendous Trifles.

The intellect is weak; it has no power except over what is as weak as itself.

The intellect is weak; it has no power except over what is as weak as itself.

A lot of my peer group think I'm an eccentric bisexual, like I may even have an ammonia-filled tentacle somewhere read more

A lot of my peer group think I'm an eccentric bisexual, like I may even have an ammonia-filled tentacle somewhere on my body. That's okay.