The Terrain Is Everything; The Germ Is

The Better Educated We Are And The More Acquired Information We Have, The Better Prepared Shall We Find Our Minds For Making Great And Fruitful Discoveries.

[those] Who Have An Excessive Faith In Their Theories Or In Their Ideas Are Not Only Poorly Disposed To Make Discoveries, But They Also Make Very Poor Observations.

Man Does Not Limit Himself To Seeing; He Thinks And Insists On Learning The Meaning Of Phenomena Whose Existence Has Been Revealed To Him By Observation. So He Reasons, Compares Facts, Puts Questions To Them, And By The Answers Which He Extracts, Tests One By Another. This Sort Of Control, By Means Of Reasoning And Facts, Is What Constitutes Experiment, Properly Speaking; And It Is The Only Process That We Have For Teaching Ourselves About The Nature Of Things Outside Us.

Hatred Is The Most Clear- Sighted, Next To Genius.

Well-observed Facts, Though Brought To Light By Passing Theories, Will Never Die; They Are The Material On Which Alone The House Of Science Will At Last Be Built.