Isn't it strange that I who have written only unpopular books should be such a popular fellow?
Interpretation
Popularity can be paradoxical; one may be well-liked despite creating work that is not widely accepted or acclaimed.
In this quote, Albert Einstein reflects on the irony of his popularity despite the fact that his literary contributions have not achieved mass appeal. It suggests that personal charm, character, and the connections one makes can lead to popularity that is independent of one's professional or creative success.
In practice
During a book club discussion about the values of authorship and popularity.
I cannot then believe in this concept of an anthropomorphic God who has the powers of interfering with these natural laws. As I said before, the most beautiful and most profound religious emotion that we can experience is the sensation of the mystical. And this mysticality is the power of all true science.
If I would follow your advice and Jesus could perceive it, he, as a Jewish teacher, surely would not approve of such behavior.
I want to know all Gods thoughts; all the rest are just details.
In the middle of adversity there is great opportunity.
I do not believe that civilization will be wiped out in a war fought with the atomic bomb. Perhaps two-thirds of the people of the earth will be killed.
To me the worst thing seems to be a school principally to work with methods of fear, force and artificial authority. Such treatment destroys the sound sentiments, the sincerity and the self-confidence of pupils and produces a subservient subject.
Whatever we have done with our lives makes us what we are when we die. And everything, absolutely everything, counts.
The first thing I ask is that people should not make use of my name, and should not call themselves Lutherans but Christians. What is Luther? The teaching is not mine. Nor was I crucified for anyone...How did I, poor stinking bag of maggots that I am, come to the point where people call the children of Christ by my evil name?
The prodigious waste of human life occasioned by this perpetual struggle for room and food, was more than supplied by the mighty power of population, acting, in some degree, unshackled, from the constant habit of emigration.
Both our present science and our present technology are so tinctured with orthodox Christian arrogance toward nature that no solution for our ecologic crisis can be expected from them alone. Since the roots of our trouble are so largely religious, the remedy must also be essentially religious, whether we call it that or not. We must rethink and refeel our nature and destiny.
Like our bodies and like our desires, the machines we have devised are possessed of a heart which is slowly reduced to embers.
Do something for somebody everyday for which you do not get paid.
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