The next era of awakening of human intellect may well produce a method
of understanding the qualitative content of equations. Today we
cannot. Today we cannot see that the water flow equations contain such
things as the barber pole structure of turbulence that one sees
between rotating cylinders. Today we cannot see whether
Schrodinger's equation contains frogs, musical composers or morality -
or whether it does not.
- Richard Feynman

To live only for some future goal is shallow. It's the sides of the
mountain which sustain life, not the top. Here's where things
grow. But of course without the top you can't have the sides. It's the
top that defines the sides. So on we go...we have a long way to
go...no hurry.
- Robert Persig, Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance

Squareness may be defined succinctly and yet thoroughly as an
inability to see quality before it's been intellectually defined, that
is, before it gets all wrapped up into words.
- Robert Persig, Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance

For we are lovers of the beautiful, yet simple in our tastes, and we
cultivate the mind without loss of manliness.
- Pericles, c. 430BC

Vi veri veniversum vicus vici.
(By the power of truth I, while living, have conquered the universe)
- Faust

How much does a person lack himself, who feels the need to have so
many things.
- Sen no Rikyu

Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est.
(For knowledge, in itself is power)
- Francis Bacon

Is there any point to which you would wish to draw my attention?"
"To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time."
"The dog did nothing in the night-time."
"That was the curious incident," remarked Sherlock Holmes.
- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Silver Blaze

All sentient beings are created unequal. The best society provides
each with equal opportunity to float at his own level.
- Frank Herbert, The Dosadi experiment

Only a fool learns from experience: I learn from the experience of
others.
- Otto von Bismarck

It is a statement so correct that it does not have to be bold, so
poignant it does not have to be pretty, so true it does not have to be
real. Shibumi is understanding rather than knowledge. Articulate
silence. In demeanour, it is modesty without prudency. In poetry, it is
eloquent brevity. And in a man, it is ... what is it? Authority
without domination?
- Trevanian, Shibumi

One must pass through knowledge and arrive at simplicity.
- Trevanian, Shibumi

Go is to western chess what philosophy is to double-entry accounting.
- Trevanian, Shibumi

To find fault is easy; to do any better may be difficult.
- Plutarch

The only way to understand what mathematicians means by infinity is to
contemplate the extent of human stupidity.
- Voltaire

Children starve while boots costing thousands of dollars leave their
mark upon the surface of the moon. We have laboured long to build a
heaven, only to find it populated with horrors.
- Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons, Watchmen

or my own part, regret nothing, Have lived life, free from
compromise, and step into the shadow now without complaint.
- Rorschach, in Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' Watchmen

Every day I improve and grow better,
For I serve and adore the noblest lady
In the world - and I declare it openly.
I am hers from head to foot,
And, even if the cold winds blow,
The love that is reigning within my heart
Keeps me warm in the deepest winter.
- Arnaud Daniel

A politician's gratitude lasts roughly a fortnight.
- Walter Marshall (Lord Marshall of Goring and South Stoke)

If you think you are too small to make a difference,
try sleeping in a closed room with a mosquito.
- African Proverb

Coming events cast their shadow before.
- Goethe

Quomodo sedet sola civitas plena populo!
facta est quasi vidua domina gentium.
How solitary lies the city filled with people!
It has become as a woman widowed, in the world.
- Dante, La Vita Nuova, canto XXVIII

Thirty spokes share the wheel's hub;
It is the centre hole that makes it useful.
Shape clay into a vessel;
It is the space within that makes it useful.
Cut doors and windows for a room;
It is the holes that make it useful.

Therefore profit comes from what is there;
Usefulness from what is not there.

- Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, chapter 11

I have a friend who's an artist, and he's sometimes taken a view that
I don't agree with...He says, "You see, I as an artist can see how
beautiful this flower is, but you as a scientist, oh, take this all
apart and it becomes a dull thing." And I think he's kind of nutty...I
might not be quite as refined aesthetically as he is; but I can
appreciate the beauty of a flower, At the same time I see much more
about the flower than he sees...it's not just beauty at this dimension
of one centimetre, there's also beauty at a smaller dimension, the
inner structure. Also the processes, the fact that the colours in the
flower evolved in order to attract insects to pollinate it is quite
interesting -- it means that insects can see the colour...A
science knowledge only adds to the excitement and mystery and awe of a
flower. It only adds; I don't understand how it subtracts.
- Richard Feynman

None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they
are free.
- Goethe

A common mistake for people to make when trying to design something
completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete
fools.
- Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy

Res ipsa
(It speaks for itself)
- Anonymous

Education is what survives when what has been learnt has been forgotten
- B.F. Skinner

There is no occupation so sweet as scholarship; scholarship is the
means of making known to us, while still in this world, the infinity
of matter, the immense grandeur of Nature, the heavens, the lands and
the seas. Scholarship has taught us piety, moderation, greatness of
heart; it snatches our souls from darkness and shows them all things,
the high and the low, the first, the last and everything in between;
scholarship furnishes us with the means of living well and happily; it
teaches us how to spend our lives without discontent and without
vexation.
- Cicero, The Tusculan Disputations

Pascal is for building pyramids -- imposing, breathtaking, static
structures built by armies pushing heavy blocks into place. Lisp is
for building organisms -- imposing, breathtaking, dynamic structures
built by squads fitting fluctuating myriads of simpler organisms into
place. The organizing principles used are the same in both cases,
except for one extraordinarily important difference: The discretionary
exportable functionality entrusted to the individual Lisp programmer
is more than an order of magnitude greater than that to be found
within Pascal enterprises. Lisp programs inflate libraries with
functions whose utility transcends the application that produced
them. ... As a result the pyramid must stand unchanged for a
millennium; the organism must evolve or perish.
- Alan Perlis

Speak softly, and carry a big stick.
- Theodore Roosevelt

Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Seek what they sought.
- Basho

Mathematicians are like Frenchmen: whenever you say something to them
they translate it into their own language, and it immediately becomes
something entirely different.
- Goethe

People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered;
….Forgive them anyway.

If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives;
….Be kind anyway.

If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies;
….Succeed anyway.

If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you;
….Be honest and frank anyway.

What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight;
….Build anyway.

If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous;
….Be happy anyway.

The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow;
….Do good anyway.

Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough;
…Give the world the best you’ve got anyway.

You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and God;
It was never between you and them anyway

Powerful message of Mother Teresa inscribed on the wall of her
Children’s Home in Calcutta

Mother Teresa's Prayer

Dearest Lord, may I see you today and every day in the person of your sick, and whilst nursing them minister to you. Though you hide yourself behind the unattractive disguise of the irritable, the exacting, the unreasonable, may I still recognize you and say, "Jesus, my patient, how sweet it is to serve you."

Lord, give me this seeing faith, then my work will never be monotonous. I will ever find joy in humoring the fancies and gratifying the wishes of all sufferers.

O beloved sick, how doubly dear you are to me, when you personify Christ; and what a privilege is mine to be allowed to tend to you.

Sweetest Lord, make me appreciative of the dignity of my vocation and its responsibilities. Never permit me to disgrace it by giving way to unkindness or impatience. And, while you are Jesus my patient, deign also to be to me a patient Jesus, bearing with my faults, looking only to my intention, which is to love and serve you in the person of each of your sick.

Lord, increase my faith, bless my effort and work, now and forevermore.

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Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi

 

Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is sadness joy; where there is darkness, light.

O Divine Master, grant that I not so much seek to be consoled, as to console; not so much to be understood, as to understand; not so much to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive, it is in pardoning that we are pardoned, it is in dying that we are born again to eternal life.

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A Simple Guide to Meditation
John Main, a Benidictine monk who developed meditation techniques, suggested that we meditate twice a day for a minimum of twenty minutes per session. The technique of meditation is very simple:

Find a quiet place and use that place every time you meditate.
Sit with the back in an upright position - be comfortable but alert and not so comfortable that you fall asleep!
Breathe regularly and become aware of the movement of the breath in and out of the body.
Gently repeat your mantra or prayer-word silently and within. John Main recommends the word Maranatha said as four distinct syllable Ma - ra - na - tha.
When distractions arise do not try to suppress them but simply return to the mantra.
If you would like to learn more about meditation there is a website at: http://info.cf.ac.uk/ccin/main/socecon/roath/church/medit.html

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Psalm 23
A Psalm of David

The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not want;

He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters;

He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake.

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil; for thou art with me;

Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me.

Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of my enemies;

Thou anointest my head with oil, my cup overflows.

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life;

And I shall dwell in the house of the LORD for ever.

 

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BUDDHA'S LAST WORDS
Parinirvana Sutra
O bhikshus! Do not grieve! Even if I were to live in the world for as long as a kalpa, our coming together would have to end.

You should know that all things in the world are impermanent; coming together inevitably means parting. Do not be troubled, for this is the nature of life. Diligently practicing right effort, you must seek liberation immediately. Within the light of wisdom, destroy the darkness of ignorance. Nothing is secure. Everything in this life is precarious.

Always wholeheartedly seek the way of liberation. All things in the world, whether moving or non-moving, are characterized by disappearance and instability.

Stop now! Do not speak! Time is passing. I am about to cross over. This is my final teaching.

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Psalm 121
The Lord My Guardian

 

I raise my eyes toward the mountains.
From where will my help come?
My help comes from the Lord,
the maker of heaven and earth.

II
God will not allow your foot to slip;
your guardian does not sleep.
Truly, the guardian of Israel
never slumbers of sleeps.
The Lord is your guardian;
the Lord is your shade
at your right hand.
By day the sun cannot harm you,
nor the moon by night.
The Lord will guard you from all evil,
will always guard your life.
The Lord will guard your coming and going,
both now and forever.

 

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Sanskrit Proverb

Look to this day
For it is life
The very life of life.
In its brief course lie all
The realities and verities of existence
The bliss of growth
The splendor of action
The glory of power

For yesterday is but a dream
And tomorrow is only a vision.
But today, well lived
Makes every yesterday a dream of happiness
And every tomorrow a vision of hope.

Look well, therefore, to this day.