God gives every bird its food, but He does not throw it into the nest. He does not unearth the good that the earth contains, but He puts it in our way, and gives us the means of getting it ourselves.

The faculties of our souls differ as widely as the features of our faces and the forms of our frames.

Life is before you,- not earthly life alone, but life- a thread running interminably through the warp of eternity.

I count this thing to be grandly true: That a noble deed is a step toward God-- Lifting the soul from the common clod To a purer air and a broader view.

There is a contemptibly quiet path for all those who are afraid of the blows and clamor of opposing forces. There is no honorable fighting for a man who is not ready to forget that he has a head to be battered and a name to be bespattered. Truth wants no champion who is not as ready to be struck as to strike for her.

There is nothing more precious to a man than his will; there is nothing which he relinquishes with so much reluctance.

Heaven is not reached at a single bound. But we build the ladder by which we rise. From the lowly earth to the vaulted skies, And we mount to its summit round by round.