William Penn

He who is taught to live upon little owes more to his father’s wisdom than he who has a great deal left to him owes to his father’s care.

Wear none of thine own Chains; but keep free, whilst thou art free.

He who is taught to live upon little owes more to his father’s wisdom than he who has a great deal left him does to his father’s care.

Do what good thou canst unknown, and be not vain of what ought rather to be felt than seen.

It were endless to dispute upon everything that is disputable.

The truest end of life is to know that life never ends.

The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity. The optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.

As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler; solitude will not be solitude, poverty will not be poverty, nor weakness weakness.

Temperate temperance is best; intemperate temperance injures the cause of temperance.

My favorite nightcap, after all this time, is still the cocktail of you.

Consequences are unpitying.

A toddling little girl is a center of common feeling which makes the most dissimilar people understand each other.

For most men, and most circumstances, pleasure –tangible material prosperity in this world -is the safest test of virtue. Progress has ever been through the pleasures rather than through the extreme sharp virtues, and the most virtuous have leaned to excess rather than to asceticism.

A minority is powerless while it conforms to the majority; it is not even a minority then; but it is irresistible when it clogs by its whole weight.

I’m like a starving man who has been given food. Maybe he’s cold, and his clothes are torn, and he’s ashamed, but he’s not unhappy.

The greatest homage we can pay truth is to use it.

Sculpture and painting have the effect of teaching us manners and abolishing hurry.

There is no such thing as public opinion. There is only published opinion.

We live thick and are in each other’s way, and stumble over one another, and I think we thus lose some respect for one another.

Give me health and a day, and I will make the pomp of emperors ridiculous.

Not only must we be good, but we must also be good for something.