“Every great railroad, and every outstanding financial institution and every mammoth business enterprise, and every great invention, began in the imagination of some one person.”

“Static people don’t fall! You fell because you were either climbing, or running. This is a sign that you are on track. Don’t stop where you fall; rise up and do it again!”

“We can’t control what other people do and how they decide to treat us, but we can control our response to them. Don’t let other people’s behavior control you. Don’t let them steal your joy; remember that your anger won’t change them, but prayer can.”

“Let [the Constitution] be taught in schools, in seminaries, and in colleges, let it be written in primers, in spelling books and in almanacs, let it be preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in legislative halls, and enforced in courts of justice. And, in short, let it become the political religion of the nation.”

“As though I had been going steadily downhill, imagining that I was going uphill. So it was in fact. In public opinion I was going uphill, and steadily as I got up it, life was ebbing away from me....And now the work's done, there's only death.”

“A nation or civilization that continues to produce soft-minded men purchases its own spiritual death on the installment plan.”

“The successful warrior is the average man, with laser-like focus.”

“God created things which had free will. That means creatures which can go wrong or right. Some people think they can imagine a creature which was free but had no possibility of going wrong, but I can't. If a thing is free to be good it's also free to be bad. And free will is what has made evil possible. Why, then, did God give them free will? Because free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having. A world of automata -of creatures that worked like machines- would hardly be worth creating. The happiness which God designs for His higher creatures is the happiness of being freely, voluntarily united to Him and to each other in an ecstasy of love and delight compared with which the most rapturous love between a man and a woman on this earth is mere milk and water. And for that they've got to be free. Of course God knew what would happen if they used their freedom the wrong way: apparently, He thought it worth the risk. (...) If God thinks this state of war in the universe a price worth paying for free will -that is, for making a real world in which creatures can do real good or harm and something of real importance can happen, instead of a toy world which only moves when He pulls the strings- then we may take it it is worth paying.”

“Some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again.”

“True art is characterized by an irresistible urge in the creative artist.” 

“Every time you smile at someone, it is an action of love, a gift to that person, a beautiful thing.” 

“Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.”

“How many times must I tell that lad never to settle himself with his back to a door?”

“With Him, nothing is impossible, but it also takes our cooperation and willingness through determination, obedience and hard work to develop what He has put in us.”

“Your subject should always answer the question “What is the problem to be solved?” or “What is the job to be done?” A”