Nullius in verba Nullius in verba The Royal Society website explains the motto thus: It is an expression of the determination of Fellows to withstand the domination of authority and to verify all statements by an appeal to facts determined by experiment. The phrase came from Horace's "Epistle" to his benefactor Maecenas, where he claims not to be devoted to any particular sect but is rather an eclectic by nature. These are the words, forming two hexameters in the original context: The minor planet known as 11059 Nulliusinverba in the asteroid belt is named after the expression. The phrase is also widely used
Sidney Verba in 2006, Verba observed: "Academics are the only people I can think of for whom this sentence makes sense: 'I'm hoping to get some time off so that I can get some work done.'" Verba grew up in Brooklyn, New York, where his family ran a "small mom-and-pop dry goods store and always worried about money." After high school he attended Harvard College, where he earned a degree in History and Literature. He began graduate school in the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University, intending to join the foreign service, but transferred to Princeton's politics