Robert A. Heinlein Quotes

Writing is not necessarily something to be ashamed of, but do it in private and wash your hands afterwards.

It`s an indulgence to sit in a room and discuss your beliefs as if they were a juicy piece of gossip.

One man`s "magic" is another man`s engineering. "Supernatural" is a null word.

Never insult anyone by accident.

Political tags - such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, and so forth - are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire.

It is a truism that almost any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.

Theology is never any help; it is searching in a dark cellar at midnight for a black cat that isn`t there. Theologians can persuade themselves of anything.

Don`t handicap your children by making their lives easy.

When a place gets crowded enough to require ID`s, social collapse is not far away. It is time to go elsewhere. The best thing about space travel is that it made it possible to go elsewhere.

When any government, or any church for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, This you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know, the end result is tyranny and oppression no matter how holy the motives.

The difference between science and the fuzzy subjects is that science requires reasoning while those other subjects merely require scholarship.

The universe never did make sense; I suspect it was built on government contract.

They didn`t want it good, they wanted it Wednesday.

One man`s theology is another man`s belly laugh.

Sex without love is merely healthy exercise.

A society that gets rid of all its troublemakers goes downhill.

I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do.

I am free, no matter what rules surround me. If I find them tolerable, I tolerate them; if I find them too obnoxious, I break them. I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do.

A competent and self-confident person is incapable of jealousy in anything. Jealousy is invariably a symptom of neurotic insecurity.

Yield to temptation. It may not pass your way again.

One of the sanest, surest, and most generous joys of life comes from being happy over the good fortune of others.

The supreme irony of life is that hardly anyone gets out of it alive.

For me, politeness is a sine qua non of civilization.

An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life.

Women and cats will do as they please, and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea.

Never underestimate the power of human stupidity.

No statement should be believed because it is made by an authority.

Everything is theoretically impossible, until it is done.

To be matter-of-fact about the world is to blunder into fantasy - and dull fantasy at that, as the real world is strange and wonderful.

May you live as long as you wish and love as long as you live.

By cultivating the beautiful we scatter the seeds of heavenly flowers, as by doing good we cultivate those that belong to humanity.

Anyone who considers protocol unimportant has never dealt with a cat.

Never worry about theory as long as the machinery does what it`s supposed to do.

Be wary of strong drink. It can make you shoot at tax collectors... and miss.

Being right too soon is socially unacceptable.

I don`t see how an article of clothing can be indecent. A person, yes.

Don`t ever become a pessimist... a pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun, and neither can stop the march of events.

"Love" is that condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own... Jealousy is a disease, love is a healthy condition. The immature mind often mistakes one for the other, or assumes that the greater the love, the greater the jealousy.

You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don`t ever count on having both at once.

I never learned from a man who agreed with me.

There is no way that writers can be tamed and rendered civilized or even cured. the only solution known to science is to provide the patient with an isolation room, where he can endure the acute stages in private and where food can be poked in to him with a stick.

One could write a history of science in reverse by assembling the solemn pronouncements of highest authority about what could not be done and could never happen.

It is a truism that almost any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creeds into law if it acquires the political power to do so, and will follow it by suppressing opposition, subverting all education to seize early the minds of the young, and by killing, locking up, or driving underground all heretics.

Progress isn`t made by early risers. It`s made by lazy men trying to find easier ways to do something.