On Human Condition
[…] naught prevents a man
From living a life even worthy of the gods.
—Lucretius, first century BC
1
An honest man is the noblest work of God.
—Alexander Pope, 1734
***
Every man is as God has made him, and sometimes a great deal worse.
—Miguel de Cervantes, 1615
What a chimera, then, is man! What a novelty, what a monster, what a chaos, what a
contradiction, what a prodigy! […] Glory and scum of the universe.
—Blaise Pascal, 1670
As I know more of mankind I expect less of them, and am ready now to call a man a good
man upon easier terms than I was formerly.
—Samuel Johnson, 1783
What a ridiculous world ours is, as far as it concerns the mind of men.
—Michael Faraday, 1853
The great mistake is that of looking upon men as virtuous, or thinking that they can be
made so by laws.
—Henry Bolingbroke, 1752
Out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made.
—Immanuel Kant, 1784
1
From On the Nature of Things; translation by William Ellery Leonard.
© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
K. K. Likharev (ed.), Essential Quotes for Scientists and Engineers,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-63332-5_16
139
[…] naught prevents a man
From living a life even worthy of the gods.
—Lucretius, first century BC
1
An honest man is the noblest work of God.
—Alexander Pope, 1734
***
Every man is as God has made him, and sometimes a great deal worse.
—Miguel de Cervantes, 1615
What a chimera, then, is man! What a novelty, what a monster, what a chaos, what a
contradiction, what a prodigy! […] Glory and scum of the universe.
—Blaise Pascal, 1670
As I know more of mankind I expect less of them, and am ready now to call a man a good
man upon easier terms than I was formerly.
—Samuel Johnson, 1783
What a ridiculous world ours is, as far as it concerns the mind of men.
—Michael Faraday, 1853
The great mistake is that of looking upon men as virtuous, or thinking that they can be
made so by laws.
—Henry Bolingbroke, 1752
Out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made.
—Immanuel Kant, 1784
1
From On the Nature of Things; translation by William Ellery Leonard.
© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
K. K. Likharev (ed.), Essential Quotes for Scientists and Engineers,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-63332-5_16
139