Brain, n. An apparatus with which we think that we think.
—Ambrose Bierce, 1906Quotes
From a man’s face, I can read his character. If I can see him walk, I know his thoughts.
—Gaius Petronius Arbiter, c. 60“I think, therefore I am” is the statement of an intellectual who underrates toothaches.
—Milan Kundera, 1990Strength of mind is exercise, not rest.
—Alexander Pope, 1733The real question is not whether machines think but whether men do.
—B.F. Skinner, 1969To be too conscious is an illness—a real thoroughgoing illness.
—Fyodor Dostoevsky, 1864The brain is an unreliable organ, it is monstrously great, monstrously developed. Swollen, like a goiter.
—Aleksandr Blok, c. 1920Is there no way out of the mind?
—Sylvia Plath, 1962Though this be madness, yet there is method in’t.
—William Shakespeare, 1603Not all heads have a brain.
—French proverbA mind lively and at ease can do with seeing nothing, and can see nothing that does not answer.
—Jane Austen, 1815The mind of man is capable of anything.
—Guy de Maupassant, 1884The march of the human mind is slow.
—Edmund Burke, 1775