“To live for a time close to great minds is the best kind of education.”

“Great minds are related to the brief span of time during which they live as great buildings are to a little square in which they stand: you cannot see them in all their magnitude because you are standing too close to them.”

“The best way of being kind to bears is not to be very close to them.”

“Once you've decided that something's absolutely true, you've closed your mind on it, and a closed mind doesn't go anywhere. Question everything. That's what education's all about.”

“The best education in the world is that got by struggling to get a living. ”

“The educator aims at a slow process of development; the propagandist, at quick results. The educator tries to tell people how to think; the propagandist, what to think. The educator strives to develop individual responsibility; the propagandist, mass effects. The educator wants thinking; the propagandist, action. The educator fails unless he achieves an open mind; the propagandist, unless he achieves a closed mind.”

“[My mother] closed the school the next day [after a visit from Castro's soldiers], because she knew that the purpose of education was the broadening and opening of children's minds. And she couldn't be a party to the systematic closing of minds, borders, freedoms and ideals.”

“The final level - of good ethics - is to deal with your enemy in the best kind of treatment as though he is a close friend!”

“The best teachers of humanity are the lives of great men.”

“The truest greatness lies in being kind, the truest wisdom in a happy mind.”