Robert A. Heinlein

Robert A. Heinlein

21 quotes

Known primarily as an American author and engineer, Robert A. Heinlein also happens to be one of the most quotable figures in our collection. Their thinking spans from Good to Science, revealing a mind that refused to stay in one lane. Our collection holds 35 quotes from Robert A. Heinlein, each offering a different angle on Good, Science, Love, Society, and Power. A line that stays with you: "Women and cats will do as they please, and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea."

“An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Good

All Quotes by Robert A. Heinlein

“One could write a history of science in reverse by assembling the solemn pronouncements of highest authority about what could not be done and could never happen.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

History

“A society that gets rid of all its troublemakers goes downhill.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Society

“Never underestimate the power of human stupidity.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Power

“Love is that condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own... Jealousy is a disease, love is a healthy condition. The immature mind often mistakes one for the other, or assumes that the greater the love, the greater the jealousy.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Happiness

“When any government, or any church for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, This you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know, the end result is tyranny and oppression no matter how holy the motives.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Government

“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.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Power

“There is no way that writers can be tamed and rendered civilized or even cured. The only solution known to science is to provide the patient with an isolation room, where he can endure the acute stages in private and where food can be poked in to him with a stick.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Food

“You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on having both at once.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Freedom

“May you live as long as you wish and love as long as you live.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Love

“Women and cats will do as they please, and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Men

“The difference between science and the fuzzy subjects is that science requires reasoning while those other subjects merely require scholarship.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Science

“When a place gets crowded enough to require ID's, social collapse is not far away. It is time to go elsewhere. The best thing about space travel is that it made it possible to go elsewhere.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Best

“A competent and self-confident person is incapable of jealousy in anything. Jealousy is invariably a symptom of neurotic insecurity.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Jealousy

“By cultivating the beautiful we scatter the seeds of heavenly flowers, as by doing good we cultivate those that belong to humanity.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Good

“One of the sanest, surest, and most generous joys of life comes from being happy over the good fortune of others.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Good

“An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Good

“Sex without love is merely healthy exercise.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Love

“The universe never did make sense I suspect it was built on government contract.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Government

“I never learned from a man who agreed with me.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Learning

“I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do. I am free, no matter what rules surround me. If I find them tolerable, I tolerate them if I find them too obnoxious, I break them. I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do.”

— Robert A. Heinlein

Alone