Henry Adams

"It was time to go. The three friends had begun life together; and the last of the three had no motive — no attraction — to carry it on after the others had gone. Education had ended for all three, and only beyond some remoter horizon could its values be fixed or renewed. Perhaps some day — say 1938, their centenary — they might be allowed to return together for a holiday, to see the mistakes of their own lives made clear in the light of the mistakes of their successors; and perhaps then, for the first time since man began his education among the carnivores, they would find a world that sensitive and timid natures could regard without a shudder."

"Energy had a way of coming and going in phases of intensity much more mysterious than the energy itself."

"The sun, according to Tyndall, wasted into space practically all its energy except an imperceptible portion that happened to fall on the earth; but even this portion was not utilizable for human purposes [...] without assistance."

"Ice, water, and vapor were phases sharply distinct. So the imperceptible portion of solar energy which fell on the earth, reappeared by some mysterious process, to an infinitely minute measure, in the singular form of intensity known as Vital Energy, and disappeared by a sudden and violent change of phase known as death."

"Man had always flattered himself that he knew — or was about to know — something [...] but he invariably found [...] that the more he knew the less he understood. [...] He knew nothing at all ! No one knew anything"

"Compared with the superficial and self-complacent optimism which seems to veneer the surface of society, the frequent and tragic outbursts of physicists, astronomers, geologists, biologists, and sociological socialists announcing the End of the World, surpass all that could be conceived as a Natural product of the time. The notes of warning verge on the grotesque; it is hysterically solemn; [...] a natural shock might easily turn it into a panic"

"Never esteem anything as of advantage to you that will make you break your word or lose your self-respect."

"Henry Adams had prophesied that the awakening would come before 1940. He missed the year by a trifle. His historic sense was sound."

"He used to say, half in jest, that his great ambition was to complete St. Augustine's Confessions, but that St. Augustine, like a great artist, had worked from multiplicity to unity, while he, like a small one, had to reverse the method and work back from unity to multiplicity."

"Niemand meint alles was er sagt, und nur wenige sagen alles was sie denken. Worte sind glitschig und Gedanken sind klebrig."