Sydney J. Harris

"The most worthwhile form of education is the kind that puts the educator inside you, as it were, so that the appetite for learning persists long after the external pressure for grades and degrees has …"

"We are just beginning to learn that our same old habits, like the exploitation of nonrenewable resources, may make us at one with the auk and the dodo."

"The acceptance of ambiguity implies more than the commonplace understanding that some good things and some bad things happen to us. It means that we know that good and evil are inextricably intermixed…"

"Young people know less than we do, but they understand more; their perception has not yet been blunted by compromise, fatigue, rationalization, and the mistaking of mere respectability for morality."

"When I hear somebody sigh that "Life is hard," I am always tempted to ask, "Compared to what?"

"Patriotism is proud of a country’s virtues and eager to correct its deficiencies; it also acknowledges the legitimate patriotism of other countries, with their own specific virtues. The pride of natio…"

"Work and play are an artificial pair of opposites, because the best kind of play contains an element of work, and the most productive kind of work must include something of the spirit of play."

"A cynic is not merely one who reads bitter lessons from the past; he is one who is prematurely disappointed in the future."