“Man is the only creature who refuses to be what he is.”

“Man is the only creature that refuses to be what he is.”

“Gentlemen, let us suppose that man is not stupid. (Indeed one cannot refuse to suppose that, if only from the one consideration, that, if man is stupid, then who is wise?) But if he is not stupid, he is monstrously ungrateful! Phenomenally ungrateful. In fact, I believe that the best definition of man is the ungrateful biped.”

“Man is not only that creature that forges tools, that reasons, and that walks upright. Man is the creature that looks up. Man praises.”

“I find that a real gardener is not a man who cultivates flowers; he is a man who cultivates the soil. He is a creature who digs himself into the earth and leaves the sight of what is on it to us gaping good-for-nothings. He lives buried in the ground. He builds his monument in a heap of compost. If he came into the Garden of Eden, he would sniff excitedly and say: "Good Lord, what humus!”

“What a strange creature is a laughing fool,As if a man were created to no useBut only to show his teeth.”