The final forming of a person's character lies in their own hands.

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

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.

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

There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the induction of a new order of things.

Without properly kept accounts it is impossible to maintain truth in its pristine purity.

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.

The liar is no better than the thief, and if his mendacity takes the form of slander he may be worse than most thieves. It puts a premium upon knavery untruthfully to attack an honest man, or even with hysterical exaggeration to assail a bad man with untruth.

Lie to a liar, for lies are his coin; steal from a thief, for that is easy; lay a trap for a trickster and catch him at first attempt, but beware of an honest man.

Not a having and a resting, but a growing and a becoming is the character of perfection as culture conceives it.

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.

Everyone sees what you appear to be, few experience what you really are.

I have envied a great many people who led difficult lives and led them well.

Those disputing, contradicting, and confuting people are generally unfortunate in their affairs. They get victory, sometimes, but they never get good will, which would be of more use to them.

Were it offered to my choice, I should have no objection to a repetition of the same life from its beginning, only asking the advantages authors have in a second edition to correct some faults in the first.

Free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or good or joy worth having.

The secret of success is learning how to use pain and pleasure instead of having pain and pleasure use you. If you do that, you're in control of your life. If you don't, life controls you.

One's philosophy is not best expressed in words; it is expressed in the choices one makes.

Our life does not develop as a result of chance, but as a result of causes.

It is your decisions, and not your conditions, that determine your destiny.

Unsuccessful people make decisions based on current situations. Successful people make decisions based on where they want to be.

If you haven't the strength to impose your own terms upon life, then you must accept the terms it offers you.

Freedom is what we do with what is done to us.

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.

Pain is certain, suffering is optional.

It is very important to know who you are. To make decisions. To show who you are.

I hope you live a life you're proud of. If you find that you are not, I hope you have the strength to start all over again.

Man is free at the moment he wishes to be.

Instead of dirt and poison we have rather chosen to fill our hives with honey and wax; thus furnishing mankind with the two noblest of things, which are sweetness and light.

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

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

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.

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.

You and only you are responsible for your life choices and decisions.

Next to the assumption of power is the responsibility of relinquishing it.

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.

The spirit of self-help is the root of all genuine growth in the individual; and, exhibited in the lives of many, it continues the true source of national vigor and strength. Help from without is often enfeebling in its effects, but help from within invariably invigorates.

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

Champions take responsibility. When the ball is coming over the net, you can be sure I want the ball.

Never esteem anything as of advantage to you that will make you break your word or lose your self-respect.

No man can reveal to you aught but that which already lies half asleep in the dawning of your knowledge.

If you cannot be honest with yourself, there is no hope of being honest with anyone else.

Peaces comes from within. Do not seek it without.

If you can allow yourself to trust those little movements round your gut that tell you when something is interesting or exciting, they will tell you where to go.

Esteem to your higher self.

Conquer yourself rather than the world.

Feelings come and go like clouds in a windy sky. Conscious breathing is my anchor.

Let us affirm what seems to be the truth, that, whether one is or is not, one and the others in relation to themselves and one another, all of them, in every way, are and are not, and appear to be and appear not to be.