Genius Quotes

There's a fine line between genius and insanity. I have erased this line.

It takes a lot of time to be a genius. You have to sit around so much, doing nothing, really doing nothing.

When you make a choice, you change the future.

Manners without sincerity, is called polite society

Never underestimate the power of thought; it is the greatest path to discovery.

A genius in the wrong position could look like a fool.

But the fact that some geniuses were laughed at does not imply that all who are laughed at are geniuses. They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.

Music resembles poetry, in each
Are nameless graces which no methods teach,
And which a master hand alone can reach.

To wander is to be alive.

If there were a master of stupidity in this world,
I would really love to listen to his success story.

Intelligence, Kant reminds, is not so much a result of genius, rather it is a consequence of a determination to use it.

Gently the waves would break (Lily heard them in her sleep); tenderly the light fell (it seemed to come through her eyelids). And it all looked, Mr. Carmichael thought, shutting his book, falling asleep, much as it used to look years ago.

The classes were valuable, but the real education was the game.

I place my fingers upon these keys typing 2,000 dreams per minute and naked of spirit dance forth my cosmic vortex upon this crucifix called language.

Real geniuses would like that what we think of ourselves is true.

Perhaps then one reason why we have no great poet, novelist or critic writing today is that we refuse to allow words their liberty. We pin them down to one meaning, their useful meaning: the meaning which makes us catch the train, the meaning which makes us pass the examination.

Men of lofty genius when they are doing the least work are most active.

I picture the vast realm of the sciences as an immense landscape scattered with patches of dark and light. The goal towards which we must work is either to extend the boundaries of the patches of light, or to increase their number. One of these tasks falls to the creative genius; the other requires a sort of sagacity combined with perfectionism.

A genius does what he masters. An ordinary man tries to master what he does.

Mediocrity is always in a rush; but whatever is worth doing at all is worth doing with consideration. For genius is nothing more nor less than doing well what anyone can do badly.