“It is clear that there is no classification of the Universe that is not arbitrary and full of conjectures. The reason for this is very simple: we do not know what kind of thing the universe is.”

Source: The Wisdom of W.E.B. Du Bois (2003), p. 10

Source: The Marianne Trilogy, Marianne, the Madame, and the Momentary Gods (1988), Chapter 17 (p. 123)

Cabe ir más lejos; cabe sospechar que no hay universo en el sentido orgánico, unificador, que tiene esa ambiciosa palabra. Si lo hay, falta conjeturar su propósito; falta conjeturar las palabras, las definiciones, las etimologías, las sinonimias, del secreto diccionario de Dios.
As translated by Lilia Graciela Vázquez
Other Inquisitions (1952), The Analytical Language of John Wilkins
Variant: We can go further; we suspect that there is no universe in the organic, unifying sense of that ambitious word. If there is, we must conjecture its purpose; we must conjecture the words, the definitions, the etymologies, the synonyms, from the secret dictionary of God.

page 38

Beautiful Minds (2010)

Source: The Spiritual Life (1947), p. 5

Variant: The universe is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.

A Conversation with Ward Cunningham (2003), Exploring with Wiki
Context: I'm not a fan of classification. It's very difficult to come up with a classification scheme that's useful when what you're most interested in is things that don't fit in, things that you didn't expect. But some people decided that every page should carry classification. They came up with a scheme, based on page names, to establish a classification structure for a wiki. And these people who care about classification maintain it.

14 December 1756
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)