1. “One sometimes finds what one is not looking for.”
2. “The unprepared mind cannot see the outstretched hand of opportunity.”
3. “It is the lone worker who makes the first advance in a subject; the details may be worked out by a team, but the prime idea is due to enterprise, thought and perception of an individual.”
4. “Penicillin cures, but wine makes people happy.”
5. “I play with microbes. there are, of course, many rules to play but when you have acquired knowledge and experience it is very pleasant to break the rules and to be able to find something nobody has thought.”
6. “The discovery of penicillin was a triumph of the accident, a fortunate occurrence that happened while I was working on a purely bacteriological problem.”
7. “Nature makes penicillin; I just found it.”
8. “I have been trying to point out that in our lives chance may have an astonishing influence and, if I my offer advice to the young laboratory worker, it would be this – never to neglect an extraordinary appearance or happening.”
9. “If penicillin can cure those that are ill, Spanish sherry can bring the dead back to life.”
10. “Penicillin sat on a shelf for ten years while I was called a quack.”
