Our great mistake in education is ... the worship of book-learning-the confusion of instruction and education. We strain the memory instead of cultivating the mind. ... We ought to follow exactly the opposite course with children-to give them a wholesome variety of mental food, and endeavour to cultivate their tastes, rather than to fill their minds with dry facts.

We must be careful what we read, and not, like the sailors of Ulysses, take bags of wind for sacks of treasure.

The idle man does not know what it is to enjoy rest, for he has not earned it.

We profit little by books we do not enjoy.

What we see depends mainly on what we look for.

The important thing is not so much that every child should be taught, as that every child should have the opportunity of teaching itself. What does it matter if the pupil know a little more or a little less? A boy who leaves school knowing much, but hating his lessons, will soon have forgotten all he ever learned; while another who had acquired a thirst for knowledge, even if he had learned little, would soon teach himself more than the first ever knew.

Your character will be what you yourself choose to make it.