Nikola Tesla Quotes

“The universal utilisation of water power and its long-distance transmission will supply every household with cheap power. The struggle for existence being lessened, there should be development along ideal rather than material lines.”

“If we want to reduce poverty and misery, if we want to give to every deserving individual what is needed for a safe existence of an intelligent being, we want to provide more machinery, more power.”

“We have soon to have everywhere smoke annihilators, dust absorbers, sterilisers of water, air, food and clothing, and accident preventers on streets and in subways.”

“As in nature, all is ebb and tide, all is wave motion, so it seems that in all branches of industry, alternating currents (electric wave motion) will have the sway.”

“Of the various branches of electrical investigation, perhaps the most interesting and immediately the most promising is that dealing with alternating currents.”

“Electrical science has revealed to us the true nature of light, has provided us with innumerable appliances and instruments of precision, and has thereby vastly added to the exactness of our knowledge.”

“Electrical science has disclosed to us the more intimate relation existing between widely different forces and phenomena and has thus led us to a more complete comprehension of Nature.”

“We wind a simple ring of iron with coils; we establish the connections to the generator, and with wonder and delight we note the effects of strange forces which we bring into play.”

“I have already demonstrated, by crucial tests, the practicability of signalling by my system from one to any other point of the globe, no matter how remote, and I shall soon convert the disbelievers.”

“The feeling is constantly growing on me that I had been the first to hear the greeting of one planet to another.”

“I constructed a laboratory in the neighbourhood of Pike's Peak. The conditions in the pure air of the Colorado Mountains proved extremely favourable for my experiments, and the results were most gratifying to me.”

“From my childhood I had been intended for the clergy. This prospect hung like a dark cloud on my mind.”

“By an irony of fate, my first employment was as a draughtsman. I hated drawing; it was for me the very worst of annoyances.”

“While I am not a believer in the orthodox sense, I commend religion, first, because every individual should have some ideal, religious, artistic, scientific, or humanitarian, to give significance to his life.”

“There is no conflict between the ideal of religion and the ideal of science, but science is opposed to theological dogmas because science is founded on fact.”

“Modern science says: "The sun is the past, the earth is the present, the moon is the future." From an incandescent mass we have originated, and into a frozen mass we shall turn.”

“The human being is a self-propelled automaton entirely under the control of external influences. He is like a float tossed about by the waves of a turbulent sea.”

“What we designate as memory is but increased responsiveness to repeated stimuli.”

“We begin to think cosmically. So far, however, universal harmony has been attained only in a single sphere of international relationship. That is the postal service.”

“Mutual understanding would be immensely facilitated by the use of one universal tongue.”

“If I would be fortunate to achieve some of my ideals, it would be on the behalf of the whole of humanity. If those hopes would become fulfilled, the most exciting thought would be that it is a deed of a Serb.”

“I myself eschew all stimulants. I also practically abstain from meat.”

“There is no doubt that some plant food, such as oatmeal, is more economical than meat, and superior to it in regard to both mechanical and mental performance.”

“In a crystal we have the clear evidence of the existence of a formative life-principle, and though we cannot understand the life of a crystal, it is none the less a living being.”

“I do not think you can name many great inventions that have been made by married men.”