Never read any book that is not a year old.

The finest people marry the two sexes in their own person.

Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood.

I ought to go upright and vital, and speak the rude truth in all ways.

Every word was once a poem.

By necessity, by proclivity, and by delight, we all quote.

Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist.

To go into solitude, a man needs to retire as much from his chamber as from society. I am not solitary whilst I read and write, though nobody is with me. But if a man...

I cannot marry the facts of William Shakespeare to his verse: Other men had led lives in some sort of keeping with their thought, but this man is in wide contrast.

The ornament of a house is the friends who frequent it.

The efforts which we make to escape from our destiny only serve to lead us into it

The populace think that your rejection of popular standards is a rejection of all standard, and mere antinomianism; and the bold sensualist will use the name of philosophy to gild his crimes. But the law...

God offers to every mind a choice between repose and truth. take which you please–you can never have both. [Essay on Intellect]

A friend might well be reckoned the masterpiece of nature.

Commerce is a game of skill which everyone cannot play and few can play well.

Let us, if we must have great actions, make our own so. All action is of infinite elasticity, and the least admits of being inflated with celestial air, until it eclipses the sun and moon.

As a cure for worrying, work is better than whiskey.

The desire of gold is not for gold. It is for the means of freedom and benefit.

Our distrust is very expensive.

Knowledge is the only elegance.

Each man has his own vocation; his talent is his call. There is one direction in which all space is open to him.

A ruddy drop of manly blood The surging sea outweighs; The world uncertain comes and goes, The lover rooted stays

Genius Borrows nobly.

An institution is the lengthened shadow of one man.

The reason why all men honor love is because it looks up, and not down; aspires and not despairs

The maker of a sentence launches out into the infinite and builds a road into Chaos and old Night, and is followed by those who hear him with something of wild, creative delight.

All the great speakers were bad speakers at first

Every hero becomes a bore at last.

Every man is a quotation from all his ancestors.

Character is higher than intellect.

Doing well is the result of doing good. That’s what capitalism is all about.

When India was explored and the wonderful riches of Indian theological literature found that dispelled once and for all the dream about Christianity being the sole revelation.

Manners are the happy way of doing things; each once a stroke of genius or of love –now repeated and hardened into usage. They form at last a rich varnish, with which the routine of...

Most of the shadows of this life are caused by standing in one’s own sunshine

Money often costs too much.

For every minute you remain angry, you give up sixty seconds of peace of mind.

The times are the masquerade of the eternities

The cheapness of man is every day’s tragedy

Without a rich heart, wealth is an ugly beggar.

Finish each day before you begin the next, and interpose a solid wall of sleep between the two. This you cannot do without temperance.

Make the most of yourself….for that is all there is of you.

To finish the moment, to find the journey’s end in every step of the road, to live the greatest number of good hours, is wisdom.

Poetry must be as new as foam, and as old as the rock.

The glory of friendship is not the outstretched hand, not the kindly smile, nor the joy of companionship; it is the spiritual inspiration that comes to one when you discover that someone else believes in...

In the highest civilization, the book is still the highest delight. He who has once known its satisfactions is provided with a resource against calamity.

In the presence of nature, a wild delight runs through the man, in spite of real sorrows. Nature says, — he is my creature, and maugre all his impertinent griefs, he shall be glad with...

Whatever you do you need courage.Whatever course you decide upon, there will always be someone to tell you that you are wrong.

To laugh often and much;to win the respect of intelligent peopleand the affection of children,to leave the world a better place,to know even one life has breathed easierbecause you have lived,this is to have succeeded.

a man only knows what he’s experienced

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his...