The need to exert power, when thwarted in the open fields of life, is the more likely to assert itself in trifles.

The passion of self-aggrandizement is persistent but plastic; it will never disappear from a vigorous mind, but may become morally higher by attaching itself to a larger conception of what constitutes the self.

A talent somewhat above mediocrity, shrewd and not too sensitive, is more likely to rise in the world than genius.

There is no way to penetrate the surface of life but by attacking it earnestly at a particular point.

To persuade is more trouble than to dominate, and the powerful seldom take this trouble if they can avoid it.

The literature of the inner life is very largely a record of struggle with the inordinate passions of the social self.

The most effective way of utilizing human energy is through an organized rivalry, which by specialization and social control is, at the same time, organized co-operation.