80 quotes
Now any dogma, based primarily on faith and emotionalism, is a dangerous weapon to use on others, since it is almost impossible to guarantee that the weapon will never be turned on the user.
The Foundation series (1951)
Well, then, arrest him. You can accuse him of something or other afterward.
The Foundation series (1951)
“That was the time to begin all-out preparations for war.”
“On the contrary. That was the time to begin all-out prevention of war.”
The Foundation series (1951)
Why, he wondered, did so many people spend their lives not trying to find answers to questions—not even thinking of questions to begin with? Was there anything more exciting in life than seeking answers?
The Foundation series (1951)
“Ponyets! They sent you?”
“Pure chance,” said Ponyets, bitterly, “or the work of my own personal malevolent demon.”
The Foundation series (1951)
“Is not all this an extraordinary concatenation of coincidence?”
Pelorat said, “If you list it like that—”
“List it any way you please,” said Trevize. “I don’t believe in extraordinary concatenations of coincidence.”
The Foundation series (1951)
No matter how the conomy and sociology of the neighbouring sectors of the Galaxy changes, there was always an elite; and it is always the characteristic of an elite that it possesses leisure as the great reward of its elite-hood.
The Foundation series (1951)
To him, a stilted geometric love of arrangement was “system,” an indefatigable and feverish interest in the pettiest facets of day-to-day bureaucracy was “industry,” indecision when right was “caution,” and blind stubbornness when wrong, “determination.”
The Foundation series (1951)
If you were to insist I was a robot, you might not consider me capable of love in some mystic human sense, but you would not be able to distinguish my reactions from that which you would call love — so what difference would it make?
The Foundation series (1951)
If there is a misuse of power, it is on her part. My crime is that I have never labored to make myself popular — I admit that much — and I have paid too little attention to fools who are old enough to be senile but young enough to have power.
The Foundation series (1951)
The whole business is the crudest sort of stratagem, since we have no way of foreseeing it to the end. It is a mere paying out of rope on the chance that somewhere along the length of it will be a noose.
The Foundation series (1951)
“As for status, that’s the sort of push and pull I’d just as soon avoid. I’ve seen many people with status, but I’m still looking for a happy one. Status won’t sit still under you; you have to continually fight to keep from sinking.
The Foundation series (1951)
This - this - was my life's work. My past - humanity's future. Foundation. So beatiful. So alive. And nothing can...Dors!
The Foundation series (1951)
“That insufferable, dull-witted donkey! That—”
Hardin broke in: “Not at all. He’s merely the product of his environment. He doesn’t understand much except that ‘I got a gun and you ain’t.’ ”
The Foundation series (1951)
Q. You do not consider your statement a disloyal one?
A. No, sir. Scientific truth is beyond loyalty and disloyalty.
Q. You are sure that your statement represents scientific truth?
A. I am.
The Foundation series (1951)
But it seemed so likely to him that on every world the earliest histories were medleys of self-serving heroisms and minidramas that were meant as morality plays and were not to be taken literally. It was surely true of Helicon, yet you would find scarcely a Heliconian who would not swear by all the tales told and insist it was all true history.
The Foundation series (1951)
I have always dealt with economic forces, rather than philosophic forces, but you can’t split history into neat little nonoverlapping divisions. For instance, religions tend to accumulate wealth when successful and that eventually tends to distort the economic development of a society.
The Foundation series (1951)
Part V, The Merchant Princes, section 18
The Foundation series (1951)
For ten years the Galactic Empire had been without an Emperor, but there was no indication of that fact in the way the Imperial Palace grounds were operated. Millennia of custom made the absence of an Emperor meaningless.
The Foundation series (1951)
Korell is that frequent phenomenon in history: the republic whose ruler has every attribute of the absolute monarch but the name. It therefore enjoyed the usual despotism unrestrained even by those two moderating influences in the legitimate monarchies: regal “honor” and court etiquette.
The Foundation series (1951)