LOUIS AGASSIZ

I cannot afford to waste my time making money.

The glacier was God's great plough set at work ages ago to grind, furrow, and knead over, as it were, the surface of the earth.

Study nature, not books.

The study of Nature is intercourse with the Highest Mind. You should never trifle with Nature.

Facts are stupid until brought into connection with some general law.

The world has arisen in some way or another. How it originated is the great question, and Darwin's theory, like all other attempts to explain the origin of life, is thus far merely conjectural. I believe he has not even made the best conjecture possible in the present state of our knowledge.

The combination in time and space of all these thoughtful conceptions exhibits not only thought. It shows also premeditation, power, wisdom, greatness, prescience, omniscience, providence. In one word, all these facts in their natural connection proclaim aloud the One God, whom man may know, adore, and love.

The time has come when scientific truth must cease to be the property of the few, when it must be woven into the common life of the world.

Every great scientific truth goes through three states: first, people say it conflicts with the Bible; next, they say it has been discovered before; lastly, they say they always believed it.

Philosophers and theologians have yet to learn that a physical fact is as sacred as a moral principle.

It must be for truth's sake, and not for the sake of its usefulness to humanity, that the scientific man studies Nature.

In Brazil a decadence that results from cross-breeding which goes on in this country to a greater extent than elsewhere. This cross-breeding is fatal to the best qualities whether of the white man, the black, or the Indian, and produces an indescribable type whose physical and mental energy suffers.

The facts will eventually test all our theories, and they form, after all, the only impartial jury to which we can appeal.

I now never make the preparations for penetrating into some small province of nature hitherto undiscovered without breathing a prayer to the Being who hides His secrets from me only to allure me graciously on to the unfolding of them.

It must be for truth's sake, and not for the sake of its usefulness to humanity, that the scientific man studies Nature. The application of science to the useful arts requires other abilities, other qualities, other tools than his; and therefore I say that the man of science who follows his studies into their practical application is false to his calling. The practical man stands ever ready to take up the work where the scientific man leaves it, and adapt it to the material wants and uses of daily life.

Nature brings us back to absolute truth whenever we wander.

Select such subjects that your pupils cannot walk out without seeing them. Train your pupils to be observers, and have them provided with the specimens about which you speak. If you can find nothing better, take a house-fly or a cricket, and let each one hold a specimen and examine it as you talk.

The study of Nature is intercourse with the Highest Mind.

The surface of the earth is not simply a stage on which the thousands of present and past inhabitants played their parts in turn. There are much more intimate relations between the earth and the living organisms which populated it, and it may even be demonstrated that the earth was developed because of them.

The possibilities of existence run so deeply into the extravagant that there is scarcely any conception too extraordinary for Nature to realise.

One naturally asks, what was the use of this great engine set at work ages ago to grind, furrow, and knead over, as it were, the surface of the earth? We have our answer in the fertile soil which spreads over the temperate regions of the globe. The glacier was God's great plough.

Embryology furnishes, also, the best measure of true affinities existing between animals.

I hail with joy- for I am a temperance man and a friend of temperance-I hail with joy the efforts that are being made to raise wine in the country. I believe that when you have everywhere cheap, pure, unadulterated wine, you will no longer have need for either prohibitory or license laws.

A smattering of everything is worth little. It is a fallacy to suppose that an encyclopaedic knowledge is desirable. The mind is made strong, not through much learning, but by the thorough possession of something.

Philosophers and theologians have yet to learn that a physical fact is as sacred as a moral principle. Our own nature demands from us this double allegiance.