Quotes I find inspiring, helpful, or fun in no specific order:
"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Out upon your guarded lips! Sew them up with pockthread, do. Else if you would be a man speak what you think today in words as hard as cannon balls, and tomorrow speak what tomorrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said today. Ah, then, exclaim the aged ladies, you shall be sure to be misunderstood! Misunderstood! It is a right fool's word. Is it so bad then to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood." --Ralph Waldo Emerson in "Self-reliance".
"Upon the fundamental doctrines of the Church we are all agreed. Our mission is to bear the message of the restored gospel to the world. Leave geology, biology, archaeology, and anthropology, no one of which has to do with the salvation of the souls of mankind, to scientific research, while we magnify our calling in the realm of the Church...." First Presidency Minutes, Apr. 7, 1931.
"Diversity of opinion does not necessitate intolerance of spirit, nor should it embitter or set rational beings against each other. ... Our religion is not hostile to real science. That which is demonstrated, we accept with joy; but vain philosophy, human theory and mere speculations of men, we do not accept nor do we adopt anything contrary to divine revelation or to good common sense." --First Presidency (Joseph F. Smith, John R. Winder, Anthon H. Lund), "Words in Season from the First Presidency", Deseret Evening News, 1910-12-17, sec. 1, p. 3.
Of the slog of scientific research: "You can either quit or say I will start over. If it’s a question that’s worth pursuing, it’s probably worth continuing to pursue." -- Mary Ellen Avery (source)
"One goes into the forest to pick food and already the thought of one fruit rather than another has grown up in one’s mind. Then, it may be one finds a different fruit and not the fruit one thought of. One joy was expected and another is given. … the moment of the finding there is in the mind a kind of thrusting back, or setting aside. The picture of the fruit you have not found is still for a moment, before you. And if you wished – if it were possible to wish – you could keep it there. You could send your soul after the good you had expected, instead of turning to the good you had got. You could refuse the real good; you could make the real fruit taste insipid by thinking of the other." -- In Perelandra by C.S. Lewis
"There are thousands of miracles performed today, wonders that would astound our grandfathers could they suddenly see them. These miracles are as great as turning water into wine, raising the dead or anything else. A miracle is not, as many believe, the setting aside or overruling natural laws. Every miracle performed in Biblical days or now, is done on natural principles and in obedience to natural law. The healing of the sick, the raising of the dead, giving eyesight to the blind, whatever it may be that is done by the power of God, is in accordance with natural law. Because we do not understand how it is done, does not argue for the impossibility of it." -- Elder Joseph Fielding Smith in "Man, His Origin and Destiny" (p. 484) (where I got it)
"Miracles cannot be in contravention of natural law, but are wrought through the operation of laws not universally or commonly recognized.... The human sense of the miraculous wanes as comprehension of the operative process increases. Achievements made possible by modern invention of telegraph and telephone with or without wires, the transmutation of mechanical power into electricity with its manifold present applications and yet future possibilities, the development of the gasoline motor, the present accomplishments in aerial navigation—these are no longer miracles in man's estimation, because they are all in some degree understood, are controlled by human agency, and, moreover, are continuous in their operation and not phenomenal. We arbitrarily classify as miracles only such phenomena as are unusual, special, transitory, and wrought by an agency beyond the power of man's control." -- Elder James E. Talmage in "Jesus the Christ" (p. 139) (where I got it)
"A model is a good model if first it interprets a wide range of observations in terms of a simple and elegant model, and second if the model makes definite predictions that can be tested, and possibly falsified, by observation." -- Stephen Hawking (source)
"Great priesthood trainers have shown me how to build that strength: it is to form a habit of pushing on through the fatigue and fear that might make you think of quitting. The Lord’s great mentors have shown me that spiritual staying power comes from working past the point when others would have taken a rest. You great priesthood leaders who have built that spiritual strength in your youth still possess it when physical strength weakens." -- President Henry B. Eyring (source)
“The inquiry is frequently made of me, 'Wherein do you differ from others in your religious views?' In reality and essence we do not differ so far in our religious views, but that we could all drink into one principle of love. One of the grand fundamental principles of ‘Mormonism’ is to receive truth, let it come from whence it may.” -- Joseph Smith, quoted in History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2nded. (Salt Lake City: Deseret News Press, 1949), 5:499.
