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.

Everybody, sooner or later, sits down to a banquet of consequences.

You can’t change how people treat you or what they say about you. All you can do is change how you react to it.

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.

Blame it or praise it, there is no denying the wild horse in us.

It is hard to imagine a more stupid or more dangerous way of making decisions than by putting those decisions in the hands of people who pay no price for being wrong.

Hold yourself responsible for a higher standard than anybody expects of you. Never excuse yourself.

The deepest sin against the human mind is to believe things without evidence.

A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.

If you want to change the world, pick up your pen and write.

However many holy words you read, However many you speak, What good will they do you If you do not act on upon them?

What you are is what you have been. What you will be is what you do now.

An hour of planning can say you 10 hours of doing.

What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as freedom should not be highly rated.

Man's tongue is soft, and bone doth lack; yet a stroke therewith may break a man's back.

The thing I hate about an argument is that it always interrupts a discussion.

With reasonable men, I will reason; with humane men I will plead; but to tyrants I will give no quarters, nor waste arguments where they will certainly be lost.

Freedom of information is a fundamental human right...for a nation that is afraid to let its people to judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people.

As leaders we are not only responsible for harvesting our own success, but for cultivating the success of the next generation.

The biggest room in the world is the room for improvement.

Here the people could stand it no longer and complained of the long voyage; but the Admiral cheered them as best he could, holding out good hope of the advantages they would have.

I have endured a great deal of ridicule without much malice; and have received a great deal of kindness, not quite free from ridicule. I am used to it.

It's a rare gift, you know, to feel reverence for your own life and to want the best, the greatest, the highest possible, here, now, for your very own.

I have no desire to suffer twice, in reality and then in retrospect.

Plant seeds of expectation in your mind; cultivate thoughts that anticipate achievement. Believe in yourself as being capable of overcoming all obstacles and weaknesses.

Now is no time to think of what you do not have. Think of what you can do with what there is.

And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed—if all records told the same tale—then the lie passed into history and became truth.

Drag your thoughts away from your troubles… by the ears, by the heels, or any other way you can manage it.

You must try to observe yourself more and more objectively, to look at everything in yourself as though another person.

The great decisions of human life have as a rule far more to do with the instincts and other mysterious unconscious factors than with conscious will and well-meaning reasonableness.