To Read Is To Voyage Through Time.

The Platonists And Their Christian Successors Held The Peculiar Notion That The Earth Was Tainted And Somehow Nasty, While The Heavens Were Perfect And Divine. The Fundamental Idea That The Earth Is A Planet, That We Are Citizens Of The Universe, Was Rejected And Forgotten.

In Mozambique, The Story Goes, Monkeys Do Not Talk, Because They Know If They Utter Even A Single Word Some Man Will Come And Put Them To Work.

These Days There Seems To Be Nowhere Left To Explore, At Least On The Land Area Of The Earth. Victims Of Their Very Success, The Explorers Now Pretty Much Stay Home.

Science Is A Way Of Thinking Much More Than It Is A Body Of Knowledge.

If We Offer Too Much Silent Assent About Mysticism And Superstition - Even When It Seems To Be Doing A Little Good - We Abet A General Climate In Which Scepticism Is Considered Impolite, Science Tiresome, And Rigorous Thinking Somehow Stuffy And Inappropriate.