An absolutely new idea is one of the rarest things known to man.

The average man does not get pleasure out of an idea because he thinks it is true; he thinks it is true because he gets pleasure out of it.

But any man who afflicts the human race with ideas must be prepared to see them misunderstood, and that is what happened to those of Jesus.

To die for an idea; it is unquestionably noble. But how much nobler it would be if men died for ideas that were true!

If it is unlawful to urge that an idea be carried out, is it also unlawful to state it academically and point out its possible merits?

The proof of an idea is not to be sought in the soundness of the man fathering it, but in the soundness of the idea itself. One asks of a pudding, not if the cook who offers it is a good woman, but if the pudding itself is good.

An individual who forces himself to accept this or that idea, or who pretends to accept this or that idea, not only on the ground that believing in it is an act of virtue, but also on the ground that doing so is prudent, is both a fool and a knave.

The older I grow the less I esteem mere ideas. In politics, particularly, they are transient and unimportant… There are only men who have character and men who lack it.