John Lancaster Spalding Quotes
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The more we live with what we imagine others think of us, the less we live with truth.
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The zest of life lies in right doing, not in the garnered harvest.
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The first requisite of a gentleman is to be true, brave and noble, and to be therefore a rebuke and scandal to venal and vulgar souls.
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They whom trifles distract and nothing occupies are but children.
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The will-the one thing it is most important to educate-we neglect.
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Language should be pure, noble and graceful, as the body should be so: for both are vestures of the Soul.
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Great deeds and utterances are now so diluted with printer’s ink that we can no longer find a sage or saint. Our worthiest men are exhibited and bewritten until they are made as uninteresting as clowns.
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The strong man is he who knows how and is able to become and be himself; the magnanimous man is he who, being strong, knows how and is able to issue forth from himself, as from a fortress, to guide, protect, encourage, and save others.
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Be watchful lest thou lose the power of desiring and loving what appeals to the soul-this is the miser’s curse-this the chain and ball the sensualist drags.
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We truly know only what we have taught ourselves.
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The lover of education labors first of all to educate himself.
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To cultivate the memory we should confide to it only what we understand and love: the rest is a useless burden; for simply to know by rote is not to know at all.
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If ancient descent could confer nobility, the lower forms of life would possess it in a greater degree than man.
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Folly will run its course and it is the part of wisdom not to take it too seriously.
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Education would be a divine thing, if it did nothing more than help us to think and love great thoughts instead of little thoughts.
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If there are but few who interest thee, why shouldst thou be disappointed if but few find thee interesting?
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In giving us dominion over the animal kingdom God has signified His will that we subdue the beast within ourselves.
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Culture makes the whole world our dwelling place; our palace in which we take our ease and find ourselves at one with all things.
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The writers who accomplish most are those who compel thought on the highest and most profoundly interesting subjects.
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Reform the world within thyself, which is thy proper world.
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The world is chiefly a mental fact. From mind it receives the forms of time and space, the principle of casualitysic, color, warmth, and beauty. Were there no mind, there would be no world.
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Wouldst thou bestow some precious gift upon thy fellows, make thyself a noble man.
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Inferior thinking and writing will make a name for a man among inferior people, who in all ages and countries, are the majority.
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Believe in no triumph which is won by the deadening of human faculty or the dwarfing of human life. Strive for truth and love, not for victory.