Cut off from his religious, metaphysical and transcendental roots, man is lost; all his actions become senseless, absurd, useless.
And how can man die better than facing fearful odds, for the ashes of his fathers, and the temples of his Gods?
Marriage and family are ordained of God. The family is the most important social unit in time and in eternity. Under God’s great plan of happiness, families can be sealed in temples and be prepared to return to dwell in His holy presence forever. That is eternal life!
Education must provide the opportunities for self-fulfillment; it can at best provide a rich and challenging environment for the individual to explore, in his own way.
The man who has no inner-life is a slave to his surroundings.
A man builds a fine house; and now he has a master, and a task for life: he is to furnish, watch, show it, and keep it in repair, the rest of his days.
Doubt is a pain too lonely to know that faith is his twin brother.
Each person has inside a basic decency and goodness. If he listens to it and acts on it, he is giving a great deal of what it is the world needs most. It is not complicated but it takes courage. It takes courage for a person to listen to his own goodness and act on it.
The very basic core of a man’s living spirit is his passion for adventure.
Faith is a living, daring confidence in God’s grace, so sure and certain that a man could stake his life on it a thousand times.
No matter how dull, or how mean, or how wise a man is, he feels that happiness is his indisputable right.
In play, a child is always above his average age, above his daily behavior; in play, it is as though he were a head taller than himself.
He who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead; his eyes are closed.
If thy brother wrongs thee, remember not so much his wrong-doing, but more than ever that he is thy brother.
A cinema villain essentially needs a moustache so he can twiddle with it gleefully as he cooks up his next nasty plan.
At his best, man is the noblest of all animals; separated from law and justice he is the worst.
The character of a man is known from his conversations.
A man’s feet should be planted in his country, but his eyes should survey the world.
All the screen cowboys behaved like real gentlemen. They didn’t drink, they didn’t smoke. When they knocked the bad guy down, they always stood with their fists up, waiting for the heavy to get back on his feet. I decided I was going to drag the bad guy to his feet and keep hitting him.
It is a paradox that every dictator has climbed to power on the ladder of free speech. Immediately on attaining power each dictator has suppressed all free speech except his own.
The life of Christ was a life of humble simplicity, yet how infinitely exalted was his mission. Christ is our example in all things.
Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats.
Ministers should not pray so loud, and long, as to exhaust the strength. It is not necessary to weary the throat and lungs in prayer. God’s ear is ever open to hear the heart-felt petitions of his humble servants, and he does not require them to wear out the organs of speech in addressing him.
Civilization is the progress toward a society of privacy. The savage’s whole existence is public, ruled by the laws of his tribe. Civilization is the process of setting man free from men.
All mankind… being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty or possessions.
God will use whatever he wants to display his glory. Heavens and stars. History and nations. People and problems.
Humility must always be the portion of any man who receives acclaim earned in the blood of his followers and the sacrifices of his friends.
It is only the impossible that is possible for God. He has given over the possible to the mechanics of matter and the autonomy of his creatures.
A youth, when at home, should be filial and, abroad, respectful to his elders. He should be earnest and truthful. He should overflow in love to all and cultivate the friendship of the good. When he has time and opportunity, after the performance of these things, he should employ them in polite studies.
True strength lies in submission which permits one to dedicate his life, through devotion, to something beyond himself.
If the grandfather of the grandfather of Jesus had known what was hidden within him, he would have stood humble and awe-struck before his soul.
The world runs on individuals pursuing their self interests. The great achievements of civilization have not come from government bureaus. Einstein didn’t construct his theory under order from a, from a bureaucrat. Henry Ford didn’t revolutionize the automobile industry that way.
We may be surprised at the people we find in heaven. God has a soft spot for sinners. His standards are quite low.
We are in the society of the teacher-judge, the doctor-judge, the educator-judge, the ‘social-worker’-judge; it is on them that the universal reign of the normative is based; and each individual, wherever he may find himself, subjects to it his body, his gestures, his behavior, his aptitudes, his achievements.
An ambassador is an honest man sent abroad to lie and intrigue for the benefit of his country.
The essence of philosophy is that a man should so live that his happiness shall depend as little as possible on external things.
Meekness implies a spirit of gratitude as opposed to an attitude of self-sufficiency, an acknowledgement of a greater power beyond oneself, a recognition of God, and an acceptance of his commandments.
Experience demands that man is the only animal which devours his own kind, for I can apply no milder term to the general prey of the rich on the poor.
A man that studieth revenge keeps his own wounds green.
Man’s loneliness is but his fear of life.
To enjoy good health, to bring true happiness to one’s family, to bring peace to all, one must first discipline and control one’s own mind. If a man can control his mind he can find the way to Enlightenment, and all wisdom and virtue will naturally come to him.
The male, for all his bravado and exploration, is the loyal one, the one who generally feels love. The female is skilled at betrayal and torture and damnation.
Within yourself deliverance must be searched for, because each man makes his own prison.
What would be left of our tragedies if an insect were to present us his?
No greater injury can be done to any youth than to let him feel that because he belongs to this or that race he will be advanced in life regardless of his own merits or efforts.
A philosophy of freedom must set out from the experience of thinking, for it is through this experience of thinking that a human being discovers his own self, finds his bearings as an independent personality.
I am more afraid of my own heart than of the pope and all his cardinals. I have within me the great pope, Self.
When one realizes that his life is worthless he either commits suicide or travels.
I know that a man who shows me his wealth is like the beggar who shows me his poverty; they are both looking for alms from me, the rich man for the alms of my envy, the poor man for the alms of my guilt.
Real education enhances the dignity of a human being and increases his or her self-respect. If only the real sense of education could be realized by each individual and carried forward in every field of human activity, the world will be so much a better place to live in.
Children are educated by what the grown-up is and not by his talk.
Every man builds his world in his own image. He has the power to choose, but no power to escape the necessity of choice.
A young man who wishes to remain a sound atheist cannot be too careful of his reading.
I think that, as life is action and passion, it is required of a man that he should share the passion and action of his time at peril of being judged not to have lived.
The fool who persists in his folly will become wise.
Where a man’s heart is, there is his treasure also.
There is a saying, ‘Eyes are the windows to the soul.’ It means, mostly, people can see through someone else by eye contact in seven seconds. I have a habit that if I meet someone I don’t know, I’d like to look at her or his eyes on purpose. When my eyes lay on them, I can immediately see their true color.
The greatness of a man’s power is the measure of his surrender.
I count him braver who overcomes his desires than him who conquers his enemies; for the hardest victory is over self.
It is the peculiar quality of a fool to perceive the faults of others and to forget his own.
No intelligent black man or black woman in his or her right black mind wants white boys and white girls coming to their homes to marry their black sons and daughters.
Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition. Whether it be true or not, I can say, for one, that I have no other so great as that of being truly esteemed of my fellow-men, by rendering myself worthy of their esteem. How far I shall succeed in gratifying this ambition is yet to be developed.
Every man has a property in his own person. This nobody has a right to, but himself.
