Robert A. Heinlein Quotes

Specialization is for insects.

Since when was an emotional argument won by logic?

Widows are far better than brides. They don't tell, they won't yell, they don't swell, they rarely smell, and they're grateful as hell.

It's a man's business to be what he is, and to be it in style.

Seems to be a deep instinct in human beings for making everything compulsory that isn't forbidden.

Waking a person unnecessarily should not be considered a capital crime. For a first offense, that is.

Take care of the cojones and the frijoles will take care of themselves. Try to have getaway money - but don't be fanatic about it.

The basic of all morality is duty, a concept with the same relation to group that self-interest has to individual.

Circumstances can force your hand. So think ahead!

A prude is a person who thinks that his own rules of propriety are natural laws.

Anything which is physically possible can always be made financially possible; money is a bugaboo of small minds.

I'm not trying to frighten you, but only a fool makes predictions based on ignorance; I am not that sort of fool.

How you behave toward cats here below determines your status in Heaven.

Once upon a time there was a Martian named Valentine Michael Smith.

To be matter-of-fact about the world is to blunder into fantasy - and dull fantasy at that, as the real world is strange and wonderful.

Revolution is an art that I pursue rather than a goal I expect to achieve. Nor is this a source of dismay; a lost cause can be as spiritually satisfying as a victory.

No storyteller has been able to dream up anything as fantastically unlikely as what really does happen in this mad Universe.

In a society in which it is a moral offense to be different from your neighbor your only escape is to never let them find out.

Audacity, always audacity - soundest principal of strategy.

Selfishness is the bedrock on which all moral behavior starts and it can be immoral only when it conflicts with a higher moral imperative.

Goodness without wisdom always accomplishes evil.

His was not a small mind bothered by logic and consistency.

A poet who reads his verse in public may have other nasty habits.

It seems to me that any law that is not enforced and can't be enforced weakens all other laws.

Progress is made by lazy men looking for easier ways to do things.

When you vote, you are exercising political authority, you're using force. And force, my friends, is violence. The supreme authority from which all other authorities are derived.

I never do anything I don't want to do. Nor does anyone, but in my case I am always aware of it.

Anything free is worth what you pay for it.

Learning isn't a means to an end; it is an end in itself.

It is impossible for a man to love his wife whole heartedly without loving all women somewhat. I suppose that the converse must be true of women.

Aside from a cold appreciation of my own genius I felt that I was a modest man.

Certainly the game is rigged. Don't let that stop you; if you don't bet you can't win.

The commonest weakness of our race is our ability to rationalize our most selfish purposes.

Women seem to have almost unlimited capacity for forgiveness. (Since it is usually a man who needs forgiveness, this must be a racial survival trait.

If possible, leave room for your enemy to become your friend.

when faced with a problem you do not understand, do any part of it you do understand, then look at it again.

What a wonderful world it is that has girls in it!

Once a month, some women act like men act all the time.

A touchstone to determine the actual worth of an "intellectual" - find out how he feels about astrology.

How can I possibly put a new idea into your heads, if I do not first remove your delusions?

When it don’t rain, the roof don’t leak; when it rains, I can’t fix it nohow.

Take big bites. Anything worth doing is worth overdoing.

The best things in history are accomplished by people who get tired of being shoved around.

There is no such thing as 'social gambling.' Either you are there to cut the other bloke's heart out and eat it -- or you're a sucker. If you don't like this choice -- don't gamble.

It was better to live with disappointment and frustration than to live without hope.

Every general prohibition creates its bootleggers.

The mind's ability to rationalize it's own shortcomings is unlimited; I am no exception.

We came here for a small, informal meeting. We find you've turned it into a circus. Well, if you're going to have a circus, you've got to have elephants.

It's amazing how much 'mature wisdom' resembles being too tired.

Long human words (the longer the better) were easy, unmistakable, and rarely changed their meanings . . . but short words were slippery, unpredictable, changing their meanings without any pattern.