"If I had my life to live over again, I would have made a rule to read some poetry and listen to some music at least once every week."

"A man who dares to waste one hour of time has not discovered the value of life."

"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science."

"The love for all living creatures is the most noble attribute of man."

"If the misery of the poor be caused not by the laws of nature, but by our institutions, great is our sin."

"I am not apt to follow blindly the lead of other men"

"The mystery of the beginning of all things is insoluble by us; and I for one must be content to remain an agnostic."

"The highest possible stage in moral culture is when we recognise that we ought to control our thoughts."

"An American monkey, after getting drunk on brandy, would never touch it again, and thus is much wiser than most men."

"We stopped looking for monsters under our bed when we realized that they were inside us."

"Intelligence is based on how efficient a species became at doing the things they need to survive."

"Blushing is the most peculiar and most human of all expressions."

"One general law, leading to the advancement of all organic beings, namely, multiply, vary, let the strongest live and the weakest die."

"We must, however, acknowledge, as it seems to me, that man with all his noble qualities... still bears in his bodily frame the indelible stamp of his lowly origin."

"Besides love and sympathy, animals exhibit other qualities connected with the social instincts which in us would be called moral."

"In the long history of humankind (and animal kind, too) those who learned to collaborate and improvise most effectively have prevailed."

"We can allow satellites, planets, suns, universe, nay whole systems of universe, to be governed by laws, but the smallest insect, we wish to be created at once by special act."

"Nothing is easier than to admit in words the truth of the universal struggle for life, or more difficult--at least I have found it so--than constantly to bear this conclusion in mind."

"Great is the power of steady misrepresentation"

"Man selects only for his own good: Nature only for that of the being which she tends."

"I see no good reasons why the views given in this volume should shock the religious views of anyone."

"...for the shield may be as important for victory, as the sword or spear."

"Freedom of thought is best promoted by the gradual illumination of men’s minds which follows from the advance of science."

"I am not the least afraid to die"

"It is not the strongest of the species that survives, not the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change."

"It is always advisable to perceive clearly our ignorance."

"To kill an error is as good a service as, and sometimes even better than, the establishing of a new truth or fact."

"There is no fundamental difference between man and animals in their ability to feel pleasure and pain, happiness, and misery."

"We are not here concerned with hopes or fears, only with truth as far as our reason permits us to discover it."

"The loss of these tastes [for poetry and music] is a loss of happiness, and may possibly be injurious to the intellect, and more probably to the moral character, by enfeebling the emotional part of our nature."

"...I feel most deeply that the whole subject is too profound for the human intellect. A dog might as well speculate on the mind of Newton.— Let each man hope & believe what he can.—"

"Natural Selection almost inevitably causes much Extinction of the less improved forms of life and induces what I have called Divergence of Character."

"The question of whether there exists a Creator and Ruler of the Universe has been answered in the affirmative by some of the highest intellects that have ever existed."

"The very essence of instinct is that it's followed independently of reason."

"We are always slow in admitting any great change of which we do not see the intermediate steps"

"Wherever the European had trod, death seemed to pursue the aboriginal."

"But Natural Selection, as we shall hereafter see, is a power incessantly ready for action, and is immeasurably superior to man's feeble efforts, as the works of Nature are to those of Art."

"A scientific man ought to have no wishes, no affections, - a mere heart of stone."

"Only picture to yourself a nice soft wife on a sofa with good fire, & books & music."

"We will now discuss in a little more detail the Struggle for Existence."

"He who understands baboons would do more towards metaphysics than Locke."

"In conclusion, it appears that nothing can be more improving to a young naturalist, than a journey in distant countries."

"Often a cold shudder has run through me, and I have asked myself whether I may have not devoted myself to a fantasy."

"One hand has surely worked throughout the universe."

"A fair result can be obtained only by fully stating and balancing the facts and arguments on both sides of each question."

"It is difficult to believe in the dreadful but quiet war lurking just below the serene facade of nature."

"But then arises the doubt, can the mind of man, which has, as I fully believe been developed from a mind as low as that possessed by the lowest animal, be trusted when it draws such grand conclusions?"

"The limit of man's knowledge in any subject possesses a high interest which is perhaps increased by its close neighbourhood to the realms of imagination."

"I have always maintained that, excepting fools, men did not differ much in intellect, only in zeal and hard work; and I still think there is an eminently important difference."

"But a plant on the edge of a deserts is said to struggle for life against the drought, though more properly it should be said to be dependent upon the moisture."