Life and Existence

The living self has one purpose only: to come into its own fullness of being, as a tree comes into full blossom, or a bird into spring beauty, or a tiger into luster.

A great novel is a kind of conversion experience. We come away from it changed.

Pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains.

Aim at Heaven and you will get earth ‘thrown in’: aim at earth and you will get neither.

Aim at Heaven and you will get earth ‘thrown in’: aim at earth and you will get neither.

Eating and reading are two pleasures that combine admirably.

Term, holidays, term, holidays, till we leave school, and then work, work, work till we die.

If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.

One does not expect old heads on young shoulders.

One does not expect old heads on young shoulders.

A WOMAN HAS TO LIVE HER LIFE, OR LIVE TO REPENT NOT HAVING LIVED IT.

Life is ours to be spent, not to be saved.

Remember, we learn nothing by speaking.

We are never more discontented with others than when we are discontented with ourselves.

The greatest thing in this world is not so much where we are, but in which direction we are moving.

The greatest thing in this world is not so much where we are, but in which direction we are moving.

Man’s mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions.

The life of every man is a diary in which he means to write one story, and writes another; and his humblest hour is when he compares the volume as it is with what he vowed to make it.

The life of every man is a diary in which he means to write one story, and writes another; and his humblest hour is when he compares the volume as it is with what he vowed to make it.

Start by doing what's necessary; then do what's possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible.

We are not interested in the possibilities of defeat; they do not exist.

 

Death closes all: but something ere the end,

 

It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:

 

It little profits that an idle king,