“Every adversity, every failure, and every heartache, carries with it the Seed of an equivalent or greater Benefit.”

“If you are influenced by the opinions of others, you will have no DESIRE of your own.”

“There is one weakness in people for which there is no remedy. It is the universal weakness of LACK OF AMBITION!”

“Practical dreamers have always been and always will be the pattern-makers of civilization.”

“Your mental attitude attracts to you everything that makes you what you are.”

“That we would doWe should do when we would, for this 'would' changes,And hath abatements and delays as manyAs there are tongues, are hands, are accidents,And then this 'should' is like a spendthrift sigh,That hurts by easing.”

“Defer no time, delays have dangerous ends.”

“By-and-by is easily said.”

“Be great in act, as you have been in thought.”

“My free drift Halts not particularly, but moves itself In a wide sea of wax; no levelled malice Infects one comma in the course I hold, But flies an eagle flight, bold and forth on, Leaving no tract behind.”

“Talking isn't doing. It is a kind of good deed to say well; and yet words are not deeds.”

“A man of no conversation should smoke.”

“The rule for hospitality and Irish "help," is, to have the same dinner every day throughout the year. At last, Mrs. O'Shaughnessylearns to cook it to a nicety, the host learns to carve it, and the guests are well served.”

“Unpunctuality is a vile habit.”

“How could you reach the pearl by only looking at the sea? If you seek the pearl, be a diver: the diver needs several qualities: he must trust his rope and his life to the Friend's hand, he must stop breathing, and he must jump.”

“You must manage yourself before you can lead someone else.”

“If you will be hard on yourself, life will be easy on you. But if you insist upon being easy on yourself, life is going to be very hard on you.”