You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today.

If all our misfortunes were laid in one common heap, whence every one must take an equal portion, most people would be contented to take their own and depart.

I was in darkness, but I took three steps and found myself in paradise. The first step was a good thought, the second, a good word; and the third, a good deed.

The man who complains about the way the ball bounces is likely the one who dropped it.

If you could kick the person in the pants responsible for most of your trouble, you wouldn’t sit for a month.

I am a true laborer: I earn that I eat, get that I wear, owe no man hate, envy no man’s happiness, glad of other men’s good, content with my harm.

I swear by my life and my love of it that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine.

Never trouble another for what you can do for yourself.

The place to improve the world is first in one's own heart and head and hands.

He who blames others has a long way to go on his journey. He who blames himself is halfway there. He who blames no one has arrived.

Hold yourself responsible for a higher standard than anybody else expects of you. Never excuse yourself. Never pity yourself. Be a hard master to yourself—and be lenient to everybody else.

There is only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving, and that’s your own self.

To a greater force, and to a better nature, you, free, are subject, and that creates the mind in you, which the heavens have not in their charge. Therefore if the present world go astray, the cause is in you, in you it is to be sought.

You cannot subsidize irresponsibility and expect people to become more responsible.

The resources, advantages, and the powers of the American people are very great, and they have, consequently, succeed to equally great responsibilities.

The aim of art, the aim of a life can only be to increase the sum of freedom and responsibility to be found in every man and in the world. It cannot, under any circumstances, be to reduce or suppress that freedom, even temporarily.

We do not do what we want and yet we are responsible for what we are—that is a fact.

If destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen we must live through all time, or die by suicide.

We know of no culture that has said, articulately, that there is no difference between men and women except in the way they contribute to the creation of the next generation.

Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.

Man must cease attributing his problems to his environment, and learn again to exercise his will - his personal responsibility in the realm of faith and morals.

Feeling sorry for yourself, and your present condition, is not only a waste of energy but the worst habit you could possibly have.

I think it’s important to realize that you can miss something, but not want it back.

Sometimes you will never know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory.

No thing great is created suddenly, any more than a bunch of grapes or a fig. If you tell me that you desire a fig, I answer you that there must be time. Let it first blossom, then bear fruit, then ripen.

Your body is precious. It is our vehicle for awakening. Treat it with care.

The greatest remedy for anger is delay.

The thought of only being a creature of the present and the past was troubling. I longed for a future, too, with hope in it. The desire to be free, awakened my determination to act, to think, and to speak.