Robert A. Heinlein - Time Quotes

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Never attempt to teach a pig to sing; it wastes your time and annoys the pig.

Robert A. Heinlein
$100 invested at 7% interest for 100 years will become $100,000, at which time it will be worth absolutely nothing.

Robert A. Heinlein
Don't ask me why it was top secret, or even restricted; our government has gotten the habit of classifying anything as secret which the all-wise statesmen and bureaucrats decide we are not big enough girls and boys to know, a Mother-Knows-Best-Dear policy. I've read that there used to be a time when a taxpayer could demand the facts on anything and get them. I don't know; it sounds Utopian.

Robert A. Heinlein
When railroading time comes you can railroad—but not before.

Robert A. Heinlein
Nothing could go wrong because nothing had...I meant "nothing would." No - Then I quit trying to phrase it, realizing that if time travel ever became widespread, English grammar was going to have to add a whole new set of tenses to describe reflexive situations - conjugations that would make the French literary tenses and the Latin historical tenses look simple.

Robert A. Heinlein
Never encourage a man to cook breakfast; it causes him to wonder if women are necessary. If you always get his breakfast and don't raise controversial issues until after his second cup of coffee, you can get away with murder the rest of the time. They don't notice other odors when they smell bacon.

Robert A. Heinlein
Time is your total capital, and the minutes of your life are painfully few.

Robert A. Heinlein
Darling, a true lady takes off her dignity with her clothes and does her whorish best. At other times you can be as modest and dignified as your persona requires.

Robert A. Heinlein
Time is never a problem on the God level. Or space. Whatever needed to deceive you was provided. But no more than that. That is the conservative principle in art at the God level. While I can't do it, not being at that level, I have seen a lot of it done. A skillful Artist in shapes and appearances does no more than necessary to create His effect.

Robert A. Heinlein
The saddest thing about ephemerals was that their little lives rarely held time enough for love.

Robert A. Heinlein
I trust that I am honest with myself. I know that I am not very sociable and I expect to go on being so; a man capable of creative work has no time to spare for fools who would like to visit.

Robert A. Heinlein