"He’s not a nut. His presence, it seems, really does stimulate the creative capabilities. All right. So what? For millions of people, that’s what you would call a profession. Teachers do not produce anything of material or intellectual value themselves. They transmit knowledge, and most important, stimulate the mental and moral growth of children—real teachers, of course. That is the great meaning of their profession, to disseminate their thoughts and actions in such a way that they interweave like a golden thread in someone else’s life and then come alive unrecognized in the discoveries and achievements of the future—a profession of utmost importance for society."

“Reason is our guide, but the eye is its most trusted counselor.”

“Just try telling a teenager that he’s a conformist. Ha! It’s safer to tweak a tiger’s whiskers. Yet who’s most influenced by fads and fashions? Who is the easiest to turn into a raging mob? The teenager.”

“There are no uninteresting fates, and each man takes away the universe when he dies.”

“We all love mysteries in books and hate them in life. I’m no exception. After all, the reason we love mysteries in books is that the secret is revealed on the last page.”

“What used to be an advantage had quickly turned into a liability, proving once more that in the mountains, as in life, nothing comes easily.”

“When the mind tries to guess the trajectory of a future moral act and concentrates too strenuously on contradictory concepts, the concepts themselves become unclear, because every concept is as deep-rooted and murky in its beginnings as the reality of life that gave rise to it. And the mind falters, determination slips away, and everything seems confused and wrong. That’s how thinking can sometimes destroy determination.”