You may not be interested in strategy, but strategy is interested in you.

There are no absolute rules of conduct, either in peace or war. Everything depends on circumstances.

Ideas that enter the mind under fire remain there securely and for ever.

Life is not an easy matter... You cannot live through it without falling into frustration and cynicism unless you have before you a great idea which raises you above personal misery, above weakness, above all kinds of perfidy and baseness.

From being a patriotic myth, the Russian people have become an awful reality.

In a serious struggle there is no worse cruelty than to be magnanimous at an inopportune time.

If we had had more time for discussion we should probably have made a great many more mistakes.

Let a man find himself, in distinction from others, on top of two wheels with a chain - at least in a poor country like Russia - and his vanity begins to swell out like his tires. In America it takes an automobile to produce this effect.

The end may justify the means as long as there is something that justifies the end.

There is a limit to the application of democratic methods. You can inquire of all the passengers as to what type of car they like to ride in, but it is impossible to question them as to whether to apply the brakes when the train is at full speed and accident threatens.

Technique is noticed most markedly in the case of those who have not mastered it.

Where force is necessary, there it must be applied boldly, decisively and completely. But one must know the limitations of force; one must know when to blend force with a maneuver, a blow with an agreement.

You may not be interested in strategy, but strategy is interested in you.

Learning carries within itself certain dangers because out of necessity one has to learn from one's enemies.

England is nothing but the last ward of the European madhouse, and quite possibly it will prove to be the ward for particularly violent cases.

Old age is the most unexpected of all things that happen to a man.

Insurrection is an art, and like all arts has its own laws.

Revolutions are always verbose.

Fascism is nothing but capitalist reaction.

If we had more time for discussion we should probably have made a great many more mistakes.

The depth and strength of a human character are defined by its moral reserves. People reveal themselves completely only when they are thrown out of the customary conditions of their life, for only then do they have to fall back on their reserves.

Not believing in force is the same as not believing in gravity.

The historic ascent of humanity, taken as a whole, may be summarized as a succession of victories of consciousness over blind forces - in nature, in society, in man himself.

Everyone has the right to be stupid on occasion, but Comrade Macdonald abuses the privilege.

Art is not a mirror to hold up to society, but a hammer with which to shape it.

Communism needs democracy like the human body needs oxygen.

The concrete is a combination of abstractions not an arbitrary or subjective combination but one that corresponds to the laws of the movement of a given phenomenon.

Abusive language and swearing are a legacy of slavery humiliation and disrespect for human dignity ones own and that of other people.

The end may justify the means as long as there is something that justifies the end

The creative union of the conscious with the unconscious is what one usually calls 'inspiration.'

Abusive language and swearing are a legacy of slavery, humiliation, and disrespect for human dignity, one's own and that of other people.

The fundamental flaw of vulgar thought lies in the fact that it wishes to content itself with motionless imprints of a reality which consists of eternal motion.

When one runs with the wolves, one must howl with the pack.

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.