The aim of all life is death.
It is not enough to be industrious; so are the ants. What are you industrious about?
There are some that only employ words for the purpose of disguising their thoughts.
The purpose of our lives is to be happy.
The grand aim of all science is to cover the greatest number of empirical facts by logical deduction from the smallest number of hypotheses or axioms.
The ancient commission of the writer has not changed. He is charged with exposing our many grievous faults and failures, with dredging up to the light our dark and dangerous dreams for the purpose of improvement.
The aim of every artist is to arrest motion, which is life, by artificial means and hold it fixed so that a hundred years later, when a stranger looks at it, it moves again since it is life.
My whole work drive has been aimed at making people understand each other and then I deliberately write this book, the aim of which is to cause hatred through partial understanding. My father would have called it a smart-alec book. It was full of tricks to make people ridiculous. If I can’t do better I have slipped badly. And that I won’t admit — yet.
Forgetting our purpose is the most frequent form of folly.
Efforts and courage are not enough without purpose and direction.
Definiteness of purpose is the starting point of all achievement.