“My favourite definition of an intellectual: Someone who has been educated beyond his/her intelligence. [Sources and Acknowledgements: Chapter 19]”
“Military intelligence is a contradiction in terms.”
“Intelligence is an accident of evolution, and not necessarily an advantage.”
“I would prefer an intelligent hell to a stupid paradise.”
“Elinor agreed to it all, for she did not think he deserved the compliment of rational opposition.”
“The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.”
“Love is my inner strength and my power.”
“You have killed my love. You used to stir my imagination. Now you don t even stir my curiosity. You simply produce no effect. I loved you because you were marvelous, because you had genius and intellect, because you realized the dreams of great poets and gave shape and substance to the shadows of art. You have thrown it all away. You are shallow and stupid”
“I have studied many philosophers and many cats. The wisdom of cats is infinitely superior.”
“Intelligence is one of the greatest human gifts. But all too often a search for knowledge drives out the search for love. This is something else I ve discovered for myself very recently. I present it to you as a hypothesis: Intelligence without the ability to give and receive affection leads to mental and moral breakdown, to neurosis, and possibly even psychosis. And I say that the mind absorbed in and involved in itself as a self-centered end, to the exclusion of human relationships, can only lead to violence and pain.”
“Madness is the acme of intelligence.”
“I find the whole business of religion profoundly interesting. But it does mystify me that otherwise intelligent people take it seriously.”
“I have a little theory that I d like to air here, if I may. What is it that you think makes you magicians? More silence. Fogg was well into rhetorical-question territory now anyway. He spoke more softly. Is it because you are intelligent? Is it because you are brave and good? Is is because you re special? Maybe. Who knows. But I ll tell you something: I think you re magicians because you re unhappy. A magician is strong because he feels pain. He feels the difference between what the world is and what he would make of it. Or what did you think that stuff in your chest was? A magician is strong because he hurts more than others. His wound is his strength. Most people carry that pain around inside them their whole lives, until they kill the pain by other means, or until it kills them. But you, my friends, you found another way: a way to use the pain. To burn it as fuel, for light and warmth. You have learned to break the world that has tried to break you.”
“You put too much stock in human intelligence, it doesn t annihilate human nature.”
“People who boast about their I.Q. are losers.”
“Anyone who knew Violet well could tell she was thinking hard, because her long hair was tied up in a ribbon to keep it out of her eyes. Violet had a real knack for inventing and building strange devices, so her brain was often filled with images of pulleys, levers, and gears, and she never wanted to be distracted by something as trivial as her hair.”
“Science is the process that takes us from confusion to understanding...”