Thomas Huxley

The great end of life is not knowledge but action.

Science is, I believe, nothing but trained and organized common sense, differing from the latter only as a veteran may differ from a raw recruit: and its methods differ from those of common sense only as far as the special appliances of a trained veteran differ from the natural resources of the untutored recruit.

The most considerable difference between a man and a monkey is that the monkey has no thumb.

The deepest sin against the human mind is to believe things without evidence.

Sit down before fact as a little child, be prepared to give up every preconceived notion, follow humbly wherever and to whatever abysses nature leads, or you shall learn nothing.

I have no doubt that in the future, as in the past, the great majority of men will continue to believe in some form of supernaturalism.

The great tragedy of science – the slaying of a beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact.

If I am to be remembered at all, I should like to be remembered as one who did his best to help the world to a clearer vision of the truth.

Logical consequences are the scarecrows of fools and the beacons of wise men.

The chessboard is the world, the pieces are the phenomena of the universe, the rules of the game are what we call the laws of Nature. The player on the other side is hidden from us. We know that his play is always fair, just, and patient. But we also know, to our cost, that he never overlooks a mistake, or makes the smallest allowance for ignorance.

The question of all questions for humanity, the problem which lies behind all others and is more interesting than any other, is the ascertainment of the place which man occupies in nature and of his relations to the universe of things.

I am not a man of science, but a man of letters who has dabbled in science.

God give me strength to face a fact though it slay me.

The only medicine for suffering, crime, and all the other woes of mankind, is wisdom.

It is the customary fate of new truths to begin as heresies and to end as superstitions.

The most valuable result of all education is the ability to make yourself do the thing you have to do, when it ought to be done, whether you like it or not; it is the first lesson that ought to be learned; and however early a man's training begins, it is probably the last lesson that he learns thoroughly.

The assertion that out of nothing nothing comes, is a self-evident proposition.

I am too much of a sceptic to deny the possibility of anything.

The world is a great game, and we are all players in it.

The man of science has learned to believe in justification, not by faith, but by verification.