Almost all of our relationships begin and most of them continue as forms of mutual exploitation, a mental or physical barter, to be terminated when one or both parties run out of goods.

It is a truism that almost any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.

The most obvious characteristic of science is its application: the fact that, as a consequence of science, one has a power to do things. And the effect this power has had need hardly be mentioned. The whole industrial revolution would almost have been impossible without the development of science.

But the power of instruction is seldom of much efficacy, except in those happy dispositions where it is almost superfluous.

We have also arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster. We might get away with it for a while, but sooner or later this combustible mixture of ignorance and power is going to blow up in our faces.

I don't feel the need to transition. I'm almost 100 percent positive I won't.

Here is the difference, nationalism has a certain connotation in Europe, which is not necessarily positive, but I think in Asia, nationalism is seen very much as a sort of natural corollary to economic progress, almost like you're independent, you progress, you are prosperous and nationalism comes with all of that.

I had a rough childhood coming up, and I just took all that negative energy and made it very positive for myself to drive me. I'm a very driven person. I have passion that almost scares people, just to be successful and make it no matter what.

I think that great poetry is the most interesting and complex use of the poet's language at that point in history, and so it's even more exciting when you read a poet like Yeats, almost 100 years old now, and you think that perhaps no one can really top that.

The decision to write in prose instead of poetry is made more by the readers than by writers. Almost no one is interested in reading narrative in verse.

That sense of a life in natural objects, which in most poetry is but a rhetorical artifice, was, then, in Wordsworth the assertion of what was for him almost literal fact.

Poetry, almost by definition, calls attention to its language and form.

Poetry is almost like my foundation for everything. I almost feel I am a better actor and writer because of it.

As civilization advances, poetry almost necessarily declines.

Even when poetry has a meaning, as it usually has, it may be inadvisable to draw it out... Perfect understanding will sometimes almost extinguish pleasure.

Poetry should... should strike the reader as a wording of his own highest thoughts, and appear almost a remembrance.

The fact of the matter is that the most unexpected and miraculous thing in my life was the arrival in it of poetry itself - as a vocation and an elevation almost.

Poetry should surprise by a fine excess and not by singularity, it should strike the reader as a wording of his own highest thoughts, and appear almost a remembrance.

It's almost worth having been in the army for the joy your freedom gives you.

I recall my mum tried to teach me how to fry chicken once, and I almost burned down half the kitchen... I don't think I have the patience for cooking.

Anyhow, a philosophical turn of thought now was not amiss, else one's patience would have given out almost at the harbour entrance. The term of her probation was eight days.

If you don't have patience in this profession, you almost always end up getting bent out of shape expecting quick results.

I had three children while doing a show, as demanding as 'Good Morning America,' so this is - you know, it's almost like I'm less daunted about motherhood, and parenting at this point in time. And I think I'm just much more fit and healthy than I was 20-years-ago.

Parenting girls makes you quite gender-conscious - it's almost impossible to fight the power of pink. It's not such a terrible thing to want to be a princess when you're five, but it would be nice if there were some other options.