I choose free libraries as the best agencies for improving the masses of the people, because they give nothing for nothing. They only help those who help themselves.

The secret of happiness is renunciation.

Show me a man of average ability but extraordinary desire and I'll show you a winner every time.

The first thing to do about an obstacle is simply to stand up to it and not complain about it or whine under it but forthrightly attack it. Stand up to your obstacles and do something about them. You will find that they haven't half the strength you think they have. Just stand up to it, that's all, and don't give way under it, and it will finally break. You will break it. Something has to break and it won't be you, it will be the obstacle.

Those who would administer [charity] wisely must, indeed, be wise, for one of the serious obstacles to the improvement of our race is indiscriminate charity. It were better for mankind that the millions of the rich were thrown into the sea than spent to encourage the slothful, the drunken, the unworthy. Of every thousand dollars spent in so-called charity today, it is probable that nine hundred and fifty dollars is unwisely spent - so spent, indeed, as to produce the very evils which it hopes to mitigate or cure.

Three generations from shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves.

Give me a man with an average ability but a burning desire to succeed and I will give you a winner in exchange every time.