Elbert Hubbard

The supernatural is the natural not yet understood.

There is no failure except in no longer trying.

Life is a paradox. Every truth has its counterpart which contradicts it; and every philosopher supplies the logic for his own undoing.

[President William] McKinley gave Rowan a letter to be delivered to Garcia; Rowan took the letter & did not ask, “Where is he at?” By the Eternal! there is a man whose form should be cast in deathless bronze & the statue placed in every college of the land. It is not book-learning young men need, nor instruction about this and that, but a stiffening of the vertebrae which will cause them to be loyal to a trust, to act promptly, concentrate their energies: do the thing—” Carry a message to Garcia!”

The secret of success is this: there is no secret of success.

If we cannot be powerful and happy and prey on others, we invent conscience and prey on ourselves.

God is good, there is no devil but fear.

Be yourself and think for yourself; and while your conclusions may not be infallible they will be nearer right than the conclusions forced upon you by those

Never explain—your friends do not need it and your enemies will not believe you anyway.

Know what you want to do, hold the thought firmly, and do every day what should be done, and every sunset will see you that much nearer the goal.

Every life is its own excuse for being.

As a rule, the man who can do all things equally well is a very mediocre individual.

A man who marries a woman to educate her falls a victim to the same fallacy as the woman who marries a man to reform him.

Wisdom must go with Sympathy, else the emotions will become maudlin and pity may be wasted on a poodle instead of a child—on a field-mouse instead of a human soul.

A woman will doubt everything you say except it be compliments to herself.

He has achieved success who has worked well, laughed often, and loved much.

One can bear grief, but it takes two to be glad.

Morality is largely a matter of geography.

Strength and strength's will are the supreme ethic. All else are dreams from hospital beds, the sly, crawling goodness of sneaking souls.

Meanness is more in half-doing than in omitting acts of generosity.

A genius is a man who takes the lemons that Fate hands him and starts a lemonade-stand with them.

To avoid criticism, do nothing, say nothing, be nothing.

Do not take life too seriously. You'll never get out of it alive.

He was as successful as a celluloid dog chasing an asbestos cat through hell.

ONE MACHINE CAN DO THE WORK OF 50 ORDINARY MEN. NO MACHINE CAN DO THE WORK OF ONE EXTRAORDINARY MAN.

The man who knows it can’t be done counts the risk, not the reward.

When you grow suspicious of a person and begin a system of espionage upon him, your punishment will be that you will find your suspicions true.

Man, like Deity, creates in his own image.

Orthodoxy: That peculiar condition where the patient can neither eliminate an old idea nor absorb a new one.

Not only does beauty fade, but it leaves a record upon the face as to what became of it.

To know the great men dead is compensation for having to live with the mediocre.

Our admiration is so given to dead martyrs that we have little time for living heroes.

A retentive memory may be a good thing, but the ability to forget is the true token of greatness.

The average woman sees only the weak points in a strong man, and the good points in a weak one.

Theology is an attempt to explain a subject by men who do not understand it. The intent is not to tell the truth but to satisfy the questioner.

Some men succeed by what they know; some by what they do; and a few by what they are. .