Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction. -- Blaise Pascal (attributed)

The programmer must seek both perfection of part and adequacy of collection. -- Alan J. Perlis

I think it is wise, and only honest, to warn you that my goal is immodest. It is not my purpose to "transfer knowledge" to you that, subsequently, you can forget again. My purpose is no less than to effectuate in each of you a noticeable, irreversable change. I want you to gain, for the rest of your lives, the insight that beautiful proofs are not "found" by trial anf error but are the result of a consciously applied design discipline. I want you to raise your quality standards. I mean, if 10 years from now, when you are doing something quick and dirty, you suddenly visualize that I am looking over your shoulders and say to yourself "Dijkstra would not have liked this", well, that would be enough immortality for me. -- E. W. Dijkstra

It was Edison who said ‘1% inspiration, 99% perspiration’. That may have been true a hundred years ago. These days it's ‘0.01% inspiration, 99.99% perspiration’, and the inspiration is the easy part. -- Linux Torvalds

If debugging is the process of removing bugs, then programming must be the process of putting them in. -- Edsger W. Dijkstra

All great things require great dedication. -- Chuck Norris(?)

The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why. –Mark Twain

People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing - that’s why we recommend it daily. ~Zig Ziglar

It is never too late to be what you might have been. –George Eliot

You take your life in your own hands, and what happens? A terrible thing, no one to blame. –Erica Jong