An excuse has no use.

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

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 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.

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.

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.

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.

When an archer misses the mark, he turns and looks for the fault within himself. Failure to hit the bull's--eye is never the fault of the target. To improve your aim, improve yourself.

We all walk in the dark and each of us must learn to turn on his or her own light.

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

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

Never trouble another for what you can do for yourself.

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.

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.

We are all one family in the world. Building a community that empowers everyone to attain their full potential through each of us respecting each other's dignity, rights and responsibilities makes thee world a better place to live.

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

Men who reject the responsibility of thought and reason can only exist as parasites on the thinking of others.