It must take account of what it decrees for today in order that today may not paralyze tomorrow.

As a member of this court I am not justified in writing my private notions of policy into the Constitution, no matter how deeply I may cherish them or how mischievous I may deem their disregard.

It is a fair summary of history to say that the safeguards of liberty have been forged in controversies involving not very nice people.

It is anomalous to hold that in order to convict a man the police cannot extract by force what is in his mind, but can extract what is in his stomach.

Wisdom too often never comes, and so one ought not to reject it merely because it comes late.

I don't like a man to be too efficient. He's likely to be not human enough.

Anybody can decide a question if only a single principle is in controversy.

Answers are not obtained by putting the wrong question and thereby begging the real one.

Old age and sickness bring out the essential characteristics of a man.

The mark of a truly civilized man is confidence in the strength and security derived from the inquiring mind.

It must take account of what it decrees for today in order that today may not paralyze tomorrow.

The real rulers in Washington are invisible, and exercise power from behind the scenes.

Litigation is the pursuit of practical ends, not a game of chess.

We forget that the most successful statesmen have been professionals. Lincoln was a professional politician.

To some lawyers, all facts are created equal.

The history of liberty has largely been the history of the observance of procedural safeguards.

Freedom of the press is not an end in itself but a means to the end of achieving a free society.

All our work, our whole life is a matter of semantics, because words are the tools with which we work, the material out of which laws are made, out of which the Constitution was written. Everything depends on our understanding of them.

It is a wise man who said that there is no greater inequality than the equal treatment of unequals.

Judicial judgment must take deep account of the day before yesterday in order that yesterday may not paralyze today.

Gratitude is one of the least articulate of the emotions, especially when it is deep.

The mode by which the inevitable is reached is effort.

The ultimate touchstone of constitutionality is the Constitution itself and not what we have said about it.

I came into the world a Jew, and although I did not live my life entirely as a Jew, I think it is fitting that I should leave as a Jew. I don't want to turn my back on a great and noble heritage.

It simply is not true that war never settles anything.

There can be no security where there is fear.

Ambiguity lurks in generality and may thus become an instrument of severity.

Ambiguity lurks in generality, and may thus become an instrument of severity.

Gratitude is one of the least articulate of the emotions especially when it is deep.

I know of no title that I deem more honorable than that of Professor of the Harvard Law School.

Nor should we exclude the possibility that Islamic terrorism may begin to make common cause with Western political extremists of the far Left and far Right.

In addressing a task, one almost always has several possible options, sometimes only a few, and they may all be practical and functional. But they lack the aesthetic aspect that raises it to architecture.

All enterprises that are entered into with indiscreet zeal may be pursued with great vigor at first, but are sure to collapse in the end.

Entropy theory is indeed a first attempt to deal with global form; but it has not been dealing with structure. All it says is that a large sum of elements may have properties not found in a smaller sample of them.

Journeys, like artists, are born and not made. A thousand differing circumstances contribute to them, few of them willed or determined by the will-whatever we may think.

The good parts of a book may be only something a writer is lucky enough to overhear or it may be the wreck of his whole damn life and one is as good as the other.

We're all like children. We may think we grow up, but to me, being grown up is death, stopping thinking, trying to find out things, going on learning.

That a peasant may become king does not render the kingdom democratic.

This means that to entrust to science - or to deliberate control according to scientific principles - more than scientific method can achieve may have deplorable effects.

It may be shocking to some people in this country to realize that, without meaning to do so, they hold views in common with Hitler when they preach discrimination against other religious, racial or economic groups.

A man may be in as just possession of truth as of a city, and yet be forced to surrender.

In relation to a writer, most readers believe in the Double Standard: they may be unfaithful to him as often as they like, but he must never, never be unfaithful to them.

Lives of great men oft remind us as we o'er their pages turn, That we too may leave behind us - Letters that we ought to burn.

Yes, and I can sit down on a white piece of paper and work because I don't believe too much into inspiration, only I'm waiting for inspiration, work and then inspiration may come. It's a little too easy to say that.

When families observe a later, deeper stage of cult involvement they may find it necessary to consider the involvement of a professional such as myself in an intervention effort.

Life is intrinsically, well, boring and dangerous at the same time. At any given moment the floor may open up. Of course, it almost never does; that's what makes it so boring.

Do not free a camel of the burden of his hump; you may be freeing him from being a camel.

Some gods may cross your path, but why should gods be beautiful? They could also be frightening.

A writer may tell me that he thinks man will ultimately become an ostrich. I cannot properly contradict him.