Quotes by Louis Dembitz Brandeis

The bow must be strung and unstrung . . . there must be time also for the unconscious thinking which comes to the busy man in his play.

When a man feels that he cannot leave his work, it is a sure sign of an impending collapse.

It is, as a rule, far more important how men pursue their occupation than what the occupation is which they select.

No people ever did or ever can attain a worthy civilization by the satisfaction merely of material needs . . .

Publicity is justly commended as a remedy for social and industrial diseases. Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants; electric light the most efficient policeman.

What are the American ideals? They are the development of the individual for his own and the common good; the development of the individual through liberty, and the attainment of the common good through democracy and social justice.

No law, written or unwritten, can be understood without a full knowledge of the facts out of which it arises, and to which it is to be applied.

There is in most Americans some spark of idealism, which can be fanned into a flame. It takes sometimes a divining rod to find what it is; but when found, and that means often, when disclosed to the owners, the results are often extraordinary.

That which is man-made can be unmade.

We may have democracy, or we may have wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both.

The general rule of law is, that the noblest of human productions -- knowledge, truths ascertained, conceptions, and ideas -- become, after voluntary communication to others, free as the air to common use.

At the foundation of our civil liberty lies the principle which denies to government officials an exceptional position before the law and which subjects them to the same rules of conduct that are commands to the citizen.

There are many men now living who were in the habit of using the age-old expression: 'It is as impossible as flying.' The discoveries in physical science, the triumphs in invention, attest the value of the process of trial and error. In large measure, these advances have been due to experimentation.

If we would guide by the light of reason, we must let our minds be bold.