There is a wide difference between the original thinker and the merely learned man.

All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.

It is difficult to find happiness within oneself, but it is impossible to find it anywhere else.

The majority of men... are not capable of thinking, but only of believing, and... are not accessible to reason, but only to authority.

Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.

A man can be himself only so long as he is alone; and if he does not love solitude, he will not love freedom; for it is only when he is alone that he is really free.

Man is the only animal who causes pain to others with no other object than wanting to do so.

Genius and madness have something in common: both live in a world that is different from that which exists for everyone else.

A pessimist is an optimist in full possession of the facts.

Religions are like fireflies. They require darkness in order to shine.

Nature shows that with the growth of intelligence comes increased capacity for pain, and it is only with the highest degree of intelligence that suffering reaches its supreme point.

Empathy is the door to wisdom.

It’s your responsibility and no one else’s to keep yourself inspired.

I never think that I am the one who must see to it that cherries grow on stalks

Make it your habit to behold the Light without the glass, so that when the glass is shattered you may not be left blind.

We have to change our thoughts before things can change.

Maybe you receive pain selfishly — thinking only of yourself. The cycle of pain wounds every participant.

I had to make water ” I said. It was the classic female excuse and no male in recorded history had ever questioned it.

These are rules I've picked up along the way to help me remain invisible when I'm writing a book, to help me show rather than tell what's taking place in the story.

Vampires are a genre now.

The more we deploy the technologies to capture wind and solar power, the cheaper those technologies become.