336 quotes
Certain success evicts one from the paradise of winning against the odds.
In Memory Yet Green (1979)
No one is so modest as not to believe himself a competent amateur sleuth.
Empire novels (1950)
Science fiction is that branch of literature that deals with human responses to changes in the level of science and technology.
Milton Ashe is not the type to marry a head of hair and a pair of eyes.
Robot series (1950)
It is well-known that the friend of a conqueror is but the last victim.
The Foundation series (1951)
There is social and psychological inertia, as well as physical inertia.
The Foundation series (1951)
It seems to be almost an invariable rule that as real power declines, the symbols of power multiply and intensify in compensation.
The Roman Empire (1967)
There is too much history and there is too little of it that is told.
The Foundation series (1951)
Trantor could win even such a war, but perhaps not without paying a price that would make victory only a pleasanter name for defeat.
Empire novels (1950)
All history shows that we do not learn from the lessons of the past.
The Foundation series (1951)
Asceticism among a ruling class—except for public show—is very rare.
The Foundation series (1951)
There are no happy endings in history, only crisis points that pass.
The Gods Themselves (1972)
Just you think first, and don't bother to speak afterward, either.
Robot series (1950)
If an interaction is too weak to be detectable or to exert influence in any way, then by any operational definition, it doesn't exist.
The Gods Themselves (1972)
At odd and unpredictable times, we cling in fright to the past.
The Foundation series (1951)
It’s funny the respectable names you can give to superstition.
The Complete Stories, Volume 1 (1990)
The easiest way to solve a problem is to deny it exists.
The Gods Themselves (1972)
It's one thing to have guts; it's another to be crazy.
The Foundation series (1951)
Societies create their own history and tend to wipe out lowly beginnings, either by forgetting them or inventing totally fictitious heroic rescues.
The Foundation series (1951)
Yet even mathematicians must be young to begin with.
The Foundation series (1951)