Elbert Hubbard Quotes

“I wish to live without hate, whim, jealousy, envy, and fear. I wish to be simple, honest, frank, natural . . to face any obstacle and meet every difficulty unabashed and unafraid.”

“The valuable person in any business is the individual who can and will cooperate with others.”

“Love is not really blind- the bandage is never so tight but that it can peep.”

“As a career, the business of an orthodox preacher is about as successful as that of a celluloid dog chasing an asbestos cat through hell.”

“Love grows by giving. The love we give away is the only love we keep. The only way to retain love is to give it away.”

“The mintage of wisdom is to know that rest is rust, and that real life is love, laughter, and work.”

“Genius is only the power of making continuous efforts.”

“Lovers are fools, but Nature makes them so.”

“The wise way to benefit humanity is to attend to your own affairs, and thus give other people an opportunity to look after theirs.”

“The man who knows it can't be done counts the risk, not the reward.”

“It is easy to get everything you want, provided you first learn to do without the things you cannot get.”

“Your neighbor is the man who needs you.”

“A little more persistence, a little more effort, and what seemed hopeless failure may turn to glorious success.”

“Strength and strength's will are the supreme ethic. All else are dreams from hospital beds, the sly, crawling goodness of sneaking souls.”

“An enemy is anyone who tells the truth about you.”

“We work to become, not to acquire.”

“Politicians regard the public as a cow to be milked”

“I would rather have a big burden and a strong back, than a weak back and a caddy to carry life's luggage.”

“Study: concentration of the mind on whatever will ultimately put something in your pocket.”

“Failure -- The man who can tell others what to do and how to do it, but never does it himself.”

“It does not make much difference what a person studies-all knowledge is related, and the man who studies anything, if he keeps at it, will be learned.”

“So long as governments set the example of killing their enemies, private individuals will occasionally kill theirs.”

“I pray that I may never meddle, interfere, dictate, give advice that is not wanted, or assist when my services are not needed. If I can help people, I'll do it by giving them a chance to help themselves; and if I can uplift or inspire, let it be by example, inference and suggestion, rather than by injunction and dictation. That is to say, I desire to be Radiant -- to Radiate Life!”

“Laws that do not embody public opinion can never be enforced.”

“A person may be very secretive and yet have no secrets.”

“Everything comes too late for those who only wait.”

“The line between failure and success is so fine that we scarcely know when we pass it: so fine that we are often on the line and do not know it.”

“Do not dump your woes upon people — keep the sad story of your life to yourself. Troubles grow by recounting them.”

“To supply a thought is mental massage; but to evolve a thought of your own is an achievement. Thinking is a brain exercise and no faculty grows save as it is exercised.”

“Every tyrant who ever lived has believed in freedom — for himself.”

“History: a collection of epitaphs.”

“There is a wild, splendid, intoxicating joy that follows work well done.”

“The path of civilization is paved with tin cans.”

“Football: A sport that bears the same relation to education that bullfighting does to agriculture.”

“One thing is sure, there are just two respectable ways to die. One is of old age, and the other is by accident.”

“Dignity is a mask we wear to hide our ignorance.”

“The great Big Black Things that have loomed against the horizon of my life, threatening to devour me, simply loomed and nothing more. The things that have really made me miss my train havealways been sweet, soft, pretty, pleasant things of which I was not in the least afraid.”

“If we cannot be powerful and happy and prey on others, we invent conscience and prey on ourselves.”

“The teacher is one who makes two ideas grow where only one grew before.”

“What people need and what they want may be very different.... Teachers are those who educate the people to appreciate the things they need.”

“It is a curious fact that of all the illusions that beset mankind none is quite so curious as that tendency to suppose that we are mentally and morally superior to those who differ from us in opinion.”

“Secrets are things we give to others to keep for us.”

“The happiness of this life depends less on what befalls you than the way in which you take it.”

“No matter how long you live, die young.”

“If pleasures are greatest in anticipation, just remember that this is also true of trouble.”

“Get happiness out of your work or you may never know what happiness is.”

“In these days, a man who says a thing cannot be done is quite apt to be interrupted by some idiot doing it.”

“The love we give away is the only love we keep.”

“Tragedy and comedy are simply questions of value; a little misfit in life makes us laugh; a great one is tragedy and cause for expression of grief.”

“Growth is often a painful process.”