Gavril Nikolaev 
In one of the episodes of “On Being” podcast, the climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe told a story that may resonate with many of us who feel helpless in the face of the environmental crisis facing our shared home. “I was talking with a pastor [in Texas] just recently,” Hayhoe said to the podcast host, “and … Read more
“Men seek retreats for themselves, houses in the country, sea-shores, and mountains,” Marcus Aurelius wrote in his meditations. “But this is altogether a mark of the most common sort of men, for it is in thy power whenever thou shalt choose to retire into thyself.” Two millennia later, Fernando Pessoa (June 13, 1888–November 30, 1935) … Read more
“Get into bed in a comfortable position, make sure the light is inadequate enough to cause a slight eyestrain, choose a book that is either terribly difficult or terribly boring … and you will be asleep in a few minutes,” writes Mortimer Adler (December 28, 1902-June 28, 2001) in his famous manual How to Read … Read more
“A human being is a part of the whole, called by us ‘Universe,’ a part limited in time and space,” Albert Einstein wrote in a beautiful letter of consolation to a grieving father. “He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest—a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. The striving … Read more