If we would only give, just once, the same amount of reflection to what we want to get out of life that we give to the question of what to do with a two weeks' vacation, we would be startled at our false standards and the aimless procession of our busy days.

Professional psychologists seem to think that they are the only people who make sense out of human actions. The rest of us know that everybody tries to do just this. What else is gossip?

help that is not positively necessary is a hindrance to a growing organism.

Vermont tradition is based on the idea that group life should leave each person as free as possible to arrange his own life. This freedom is the only climate in which (we feel) a human being may create his own happiness. ... Character itself lies deep and secret below the surface, unknown and unknowable by others. It is the mysterious core of life, which every man or woman has to cope with alone, to live with, to conquer and put in order, or to be defeated by.

What's the use of inventing a better system as long as there just aren't enough folks with sense to go around?

Vermont is the only place in America where I ever hear thrift spoken of with respect.

You think religion is what's inside a little building filled with pretty lights from stained glass windows. But it's not. It's wings! Wings!