"How strange is the lot of us mortals! Each of us is here for a
brief sojourn; for what purpose he knows not, though he sometimes
thinks he senses it. But without deeper reflection one knows from
daily life that one exists for other people -- first of all for
those upon whose smiles and well-being our own happiness is wholly
dependent, and then for the many, unknown to us, to whose destinies
we are bound by the ties of sympathy. A hundred times every day
I remind myself that my inner and outer life are based on the labors
of other men, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order
to give in the same measure as I have received and am still receiving...
"My passionate sense
of social justice and social responsibility has always contrasted
oddly with my pronounced lack of need for direct contact with other
human beings and human communities. I am truly a 'lone traveler'
and have never belonged to my country, my home, my friends, or even
my immediate family, with my whole heart; in the face of all these
ties, I have never lost a sense of distance and a need for solitude..."
"This topic brings
me to that worst outcrop of herd life, the military system, which
I abhor... This plague-spot of civilization ought to be abolished
with all possible speed. Heroism on command, senseless violence,
and all the loathsome nonsense that goes by the name of patriotism
-- how passionately I hate them!
clipped from: www.aip.org 
