We are spectacular splendid manifestations of life. We have language. We have affection. And finally, and perhaps best of all, we have music.

It is from the progeny of this parent cell that we all take our looks; we still share genes around, and the resemblance of the enzymes of grasses to those of whales is in fact a family resemblance.

The capacity to blunder slightly is the real marvel of DNA. Without this special attribute, we would still be anaerobic bacteria and there would be no music.

Statistically, the probability of any one of us being here is so small that you'd think the mere fact of existing would keep us all in a contented dazzlement of surprise.

In real life, every field of science is incomplete, and most of them - whatever the record of accomplishment during the last 200 years - are still in their very earliest stages.

We owe our lives to the sun... How is it, then, that we feel no gratitude?

The greatest single achievement of nature to date was surely the invention of the molecule DNA.

It is in our genes to understand the universe if we can, to keep trying even if we cannot, and to be enchanted by the act of learning all the way.

I would send the complete works of Johann Sebastian Bach into outer space on the Voyager spacecraft. But that would be boasting.

Animals have genes for altruism, and those genes have been selected in the evolution of many creatures because of the advantage they confer for the continuing survival of the species.

We leave traces of ourselves wherever we go, on whatever we touch.

What I'm looking for is not out there, it is in me.

Saying you liked all music meant that you didn't love any.

Such grief might be to them quite delicious, a delicacy.

Happiness has many roots but none more important than security.

I am perfectly willing for my music to exist with somebody else's taste.

The cradle of the future is the grave of the past.

I'm here to tell you that a champion is someone who has fallen off the horse a dozen times and gotten back on the horse a dozen times. Successful people never give up.

If any ideology is so serious that you can't have fun while you're doing it, it's probably too serious.

You can study orchestration, you can study harmony and theory and everything else, but melodies come straight from God.

Hesperus bringing together All that the morning star scattered.