Up to now, America has not been a good milieu for the rise of a mass movement. What starts out here as a mass movement ends up as a racket, a cult, or a corporation.

Our achievements speak for themselves. What we have to keep track of are our failures, discouragements and doubts.

Our sense of power is more vivid when we break a man's spirit than when we win his heart. For we can win a man's heart one day and lose it the next. But when we break a proud spirit we achieve something that is final and absolute.

The link between ideas and action is rarely direct. There is almost always an intermediate step in which the idea is overcome.

The majority prove their worth by keeping busy. A busy life is the nearest thing to a purposeful life.

In running away from ourselves we either fall on our neighbor's shoulder or fly at his throat.

There is a powerful craving in most of us to see ourselves as instruments in the hands of others and thus free ourselves from the responsibility for acts which are prompted by our own questionable inclinations and impulses.