I don't like these cold, precise, perfect people, who, in order not to speak wrong, never speak at all, and in order not to do wrong, never do anything.
— Henry Ward Beecher
All men are tempted. There is no man that lives that can't be broken down, provided it is the right temptation, put in the right spot.
Clothes and manners do not make the man; but, when he is made, they greatly improve his appearance.
God pardons like a mother, who kisses the offense into everlasting forgiveness.
The dog was created specially for children. He is a god of frolic.
Compassion will cure more sins than condemnation.
Well married a person has wings, poorly married shackles.
When a nation's young men are conservative, its funeral bell is already rung.
The worst thing in this world, next to anarchy, is government.
Every tomorrow has two handles. We can take hold of it with the handle of anxiety or the handle of faith.
There are joys which long to be ours. God sends ten thousands truths, which come about us like birds seeking inlet; but we are shut up to them, and so they bring us nothing, but sit and sing awhile upon the roof, and then fly away.
What we call wisdom is the result of all the wisdom of past ages. Our best institutions are like young trees growing upon the roots of the old trunks that have crumbled away.
Mirth is the sweet wine of human life. It should be offered sparkling with zestful life unto God.
To become an able and successful man in any profession, three things are necessary, nature, study and practice.
In this world it is not what we take up, but what we give up, that makes us rich.
God made man to go by motives, and he will not go without them, any more than a boat without steam or a balloon without gas.
The real man is one who always finds excuses for others, but never excuses himself.
Love cannot endure indifference. It needs to be wanted. Like a lamp, it needs to be fed out of the oil of another's heart, or its flame burns low.
Laughter is day, and sobriety is night; a smile is the twilight that hovers gently between both, more bewitching than either.
Children are unpredictable. You never know what inconsistency they are going to catch you in next.
A man that does not know how to be angry does not know how to be good.
Children are the hands by which we take hold of heaven.
Expedients are for the hour, but principles are for the ages.
Gratitude is the fairest blossom which springs from the soul.
Tears are often the telescope by which men see far into heaven.
No matter what looms ahead, if you can eat today, enjoy today, mix good cheer with friends today enjoy it and bless God for it.
You cannot sift out the poor from the community. The poor are indispensable to the rich.
A person without a sense of humor is like a wagon without springs. It's jolted by every pebble on the road.
It is one of the severest tests of friendship to tell your friend his faults. So to love a man that you cannot bear to see a stain upon him, and to speak painful truth through loving words, that is friendship.
Theology is a science of mind applied to God.
Selfishness is that detestable vice which no one will forgive in others, and no one is without himself.
Riches are not an end of life, but an instrument of life.
Young love is a flame; very pretty, often very hot and fierce, but still only light and flickering. The love of the older and disciplined heart is as coals, deep-burning, unquenchable.
The moment an ill can be patiently handled, it is disarmed of its poison, though not of its pain.
We sleep, but the loom of life never stops, and the pattern which was weaving when the sun went down is weaving when it comes up in the morning.
God asks no man whether he will accept life. That is not the choice. You must take it. The only choice is how.
The humblest individual exerts some influence, either for good or evil, upon others.
What a mother sings to the cradle goes all the way down to the coffin.
Love is the river of life in the world.
Success is full of promise till one gets it, and then it seems like a nest from which the bird has flown.
A Christian is nothing but a sinful man who has put himself to school for Christ for the honest purpose of becoming better.
Law represents the effort of man to organize society; governments, the efforts of selfishness to overthrow liberty.
Pride slays thanksgiving, but a humble mind is the soil out of which thanks naturally grow. A proud man is seldom a grateful man, for he never thinks he gets as much as he deserves.
Laugh at your friends, and if your friends are sore; So much the better, you may laugh the more.
You have come into a hard world. I know of only one easy place in it, and that is the grave.
Of all the music that reached farthest into heaven, it is the beating of a loving heart.
Good nature is worth more than knowledge, more than money, more than honor, to the persons who possess it.
A man's true state of power and riches is to be in himself.
Suffering is part of the divine idea.
The soul without imagination is what an observatory would be without a telescope.
