Nobody, they say, is a hero to his valet. Of course; for a man must be a hero to understand a hero. The valet, I dare say, has great respect for some person of his own stamp.

Live each day as if your life had just begun.

Correction does much, but encouragement does more.

We do not have to visit a madhouse to find disordered minds; our planet is the mental institution of the universe.

Every day we should hear at least one little song, read one good poem, see one exquisite picture, and, if possible, speak a few sensible words.

The moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. Whatever you think you can do, or believe you can do, begin it. Action has magic, power and grace.

Magic is believing in yourself, if you can do that, you can make anything happen.

At the moment of commitment the entire universe conspires to assist you.

Courage is the commitment to begin without any guarantee of success.

If I accept you as you are, I will make you worse; however, if I treat you as though you are what you are capable of becoming, I help you become that.

There is nothing worse than aggressive stupidity.

I think you feel like, unless you're damagedyou're not deep enough or mysterious enoughor complicated enough to ever be appreciated by another.And that is deeply untrue.

If a song's meant to stay around, you carry it with you in your bones.

Your passion for words & sentence structure should equal a painter's passion for color & brushstroke.

Nothing in the world is certain except for death and taxes.

More and more I find I want to be living in a Big Here and a Long Now.

And I smiled to think God's greatness flowed around our incompleteness; Round our restlessness, His rest.

God blessed me by putting me here for thirty-one years at Michigan and Trumbull.

The deepest longing of the human heart is to know and enjoy the glory of God. We were made for this.

School is a twelve-year jail sentence where bad habits are the only curriculum truly learned.

If, while I hear the wild shriek of the slave mother robbed of her little ones, I do not open my mouth, am I not guilty?