Be a lamp, a lifeboat, a ladder. Help someone’s soul heal. Walk out of your house like a shepherd.
No man but a blockhead ever wrote, except for money.
This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap; the being a force of Nature instead of a feverish selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.
Revolutions are always verbose.
You are braver than you believe. Stronger than you seem. And smarter than you think.
Of what use, however, is a general certainty that an insect will not walk with his head hindmost, when what you need to know is the play of inward stimulus that sends him hither and thither in a network of possible paths?
I have thought of a pulley to raise me gradually; but that would give me pain, as it would counteract my natural inclination. I would have something that can dissipate the inertia and give elasticity to the muscles. We can heat the body, we can cool it; we can give it tension or relaxation; and surely it is possible to bring it into a state in which rising from bed will not be a pain.
It has been my philosophy of life that difficulties vanish when faced boldly.
So I became a newspaperman. I hated to do it but I couldnt find honest employment.
In this war, a danger there is, of losing who we are.
Ordinary people seem not to realize that those who really apply themselves in the right way to philosophy are directly and of their own accord preparing themselves for dying and death.
The most dangerous thing is illusion.
It is, indeed, at home that every man must be known by those who would make a just estimate either of his virtue or felicity; for smiles and embroidery are alike occasional, and the mind is often dressed for show in painted honor, and fictitious benevolence.
Do not tell me of my obligation to put all poor men in good situations. Are they my poor? I tell thee, thou foolish philanthropist, that I grudge the dollar, the dime, the cent, I give to such men as do not belong to me and to whom I do not belong.
An empire is an immense egotism.
There is as much difference between the counsel that a friend giveth, and that a man giveth himself, as there is between the counsel of a friend and of a flatterer. For there is no such flatterer as is a man’s self.
When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years.
We can’t plan life. All we can do is be available for it.
I am a democrat only on principle, not by instinct – nobody is that. Doubtless some people say they are, but this world is grievously given to lying.
Today is the oldest you’ve ever been, and the youngest you’ll ever be again.
He is great who confers the most benefits.
