What is much harder to handle is the sense that you have to live up to the mark someone else has set for you. The grades become too important, the competition too frantic, the fear of disappointing those who believe in you turns into an overwhelming nightmare.

As WArden Lawes once said of convicts, no man can be called a failure until he has tried something he really likes, and fails at it.

Marriages we regard as the happiest are those in which each of the partners believes he or she got the best of it.

It may be true that the weak will always be driven to the wall; but it is the task of a just society to see that the wall is climbable.

The main discomfort in being a middle-of-the-roader is that you get sideswiped by partisans going in both directions.

Good teaching must be slow enough so that it is not confusing, and fast enough so that it is not boring.

As we grow older, we should learn that these are two quite different things. Character is something you forge for yourself; temperament is something you are born with and can only slightly modify. Some people have easy temperaments and weak characters; others have difficult temperaments and strong characters. We are all prone to confuse the two in assessing people we associate with. Those with easy temperaments and weak characters are more likable than admirable; those with difficult temperaments and strong characters are more admirable than likable.