Up to the moment when the contract for a battleship has been definitely signed, the vessel is the heir to all the expanding naval science of the world, but from the day when the design has been finally fixed, she becomes obsolescent, and she has become a wasting security.

Winston Churchill · House of Commons, 18 March 1912

Expert knowledge, however indispensable, is no substitute for a generous and comprehending outlook upon the human story with all its sadness, with all its unquenchable hope.

Winston Churchill · Churchill at the University of Copenhagen in 1950, on what education is for.

By a blessed dispensation, human beings forget physical pain much more quickly than they do their joyous emotions and experiences.

Winston Churchill · Fourth Alamein Reunion, Empress Hall, London, 21 October 1949

Victory is traditionally elusive. Accidents happen. Mistakes are made. Sometimes right things turn out wrong, and quite often wrong things turn out right.

Winston Churchill · House of Commons, 11 December 1941

An escalator can never break, it can only become stairs.

Mitch Hedberg · From the bit that ends "Escalator temporarily stairs. Sorry for the convenience"; a fan was already quoting it on Usenet in September 2000.

The unleashed power of the atom bomb has changed everything except our modes of thinking, and thus we drift toward unparalleled catastrophes.

Albert Einstein · From a letter for the Emergency Committee of Atomic Scientists, 23 May 1946.

Why does this magnificent applied science, which saves work and makes life easier, bring us so little happiness? The simple answer: because we have not yet learned to make a sensible use of it.

Albert Einstein · From Science and Dictatorship, 1930.

“Up to the moment when the contract for a battleship has been definitely signed, the vessel is the heir to all the expanding naval science of the world, but from the day when the design has been finally fixed, she becomes obsolescent, and she has become a wasting security.”

“Expert knowledge, however indispensable, is no substitute for a generous and comprehending outlook upon the human story with all its sadness, with all its unquenchable hope.”

“By a blessed dispensation, human beings forget physical pain much more quickly than they do their joyous emotions and experiences.”

“Victory is traditionally elusive. Accidents happen. Mistakes are made. Sometimes right things turn out wrong, and quite often wrong things turn out right.”

“An escalator can never break, it can only become stairs.”

“The unleashed power of the atom bomb has changed everything except our modes of thinking, and thus we drift toward unparalleled catastrophes.”

“Why does this magnificent applied science, which saves work and makes life easier, bring us so little happiness? The simple answer: because we have not yet learned to make a sensible use of it.”

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