Nature

Cities … do not last. The first was founded but ten thousand years ago, and many have come and gone since then. Sometimes, the sole evidence of their passing lies in evolution.

When their fuel runs out, ... stars collapse dramatically in upon themselves, and as they do so, enormous amounts of gravitational energy are released and converted into heat.

You stand there, braced. Cloud shadows race over the buff rock stacks as a projected film, casting a queasy, mottled ground rash. The air hisses and it is no local breeze but the great harsh sweep of wind from the turning of the earth.

The first man who having enclosed a piece of ground, bethought himself of saying ‘This is mine’, and found people simple enough to believe him, was the real founder of civil society.

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.

In 1922, the year in which Mussolini became prime-minister, Sonjedelrup-Ebbe showed how even starving hens always allowed their leader (the 'alpha' hen) to eat first and did not dare interfere until it had finished; how if it was removed, the hens

A black crow
Has settled himself
On a leafless tree,
Fall of an autumn day.

At midnight
Under the bright moon,
A secret worm
Digs into a chestnut.

On a snowy morning,

In the cavernous interior of the Excalibur Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada, there are ranks of gambling machines lined up like gaudy soldiers on parade, each one to a common design, though subtly different. They invite you to make a close inspection.

Carbon lies at the centre of life, its ubiquitous and indispensable ingredient. Carbon atoms link together in chains, and bind with other atoms, to make the whole array of organic chemicals that constitute life itself, from DNA to toenails.