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America is never wholly herself unless she is engaged in high moral principle. We as a people have such a purpose today. It is to make kinder the face of the nation and gentler the face of the world.
Sep 30, 2025
The world is made up of people who never quite get into the first team and who just miss the prizes at the flower show.
Ideals are like the stars: we never reach them, but like the mariners of the sea, we chart our course by them.
The worth of the state, in the long run, is the worth of the individuals composing it.
The Americans, on the contrary, are fond of explaining almost all the actions of their lives by the principle of interest rightly understood; they show with complacency how an enlightened regard for themselves constantly prompts them to assist each other, and inclines them willingly to sacrifice a portion of their time and property to the welfare of the state.
The imperative is to define what is right and do it.
In no direction that we turn do we find ease or comfort. If we are honest and if we have the will to win we find only danger, hard work and iron resolution.
You must look into people, as well as at them.
For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business.
Half a man's wisdom goes with his courage.
The exile is a singular, whereas refugees tend to be thought of in the mass ... What is implied in these nuances of social standing is the respect we pay to choice. The exile appears to have made a decision, while the refugee is the very image of helplessness.
Whoever kindles the flames of intolerance in America is lighting a fire underneath his own home.
Those who won our independence by revolution were not cowards. They did not fear political change. They did not exalt order at the cost of liberty.
When kindness has left people, even for a few moments, we become afraid of them, as if their reason had left them.
Every heart is the other heart. Every soul is the other soul. Every face is the other face. The individual is the one illusion.
Here is not merely a nation but a teeming nation of nations.
I would give no thought of what the world might say of me, if I could only transmit to posterity the reputation of an honest man.
Responsibility is the price every man must pay for freedom.
An earthly kingdom cannot exist without inequality of persons. Some must be free, some serfs, some rulers, some subjects.
What if the healing of the world utterly depends on the ten-thousand invisible kindnesses we offer simply and quietly throughout the pilgrimage of each human life?
All free governments are managed by the combined wisdom and folly of the people.
Of mankind in general, the parts are greater than the whole.
Sometimes it is better to work out the map for yourself rather than have it given to you, in terms of learning.
A man never discloses his own character so clearly as when he describes anothers.
The four cornerstones of character on which the structure of this nation was built are: Initiative, Imagination, Individuality and Independence.
Never separate the life you live from the words you speak.
A nation is formed by the willingness of each of us to share in the responsibility for upholding the common good.
There is no such thing as a "self-made" man. We are made up of thousands of others. Everyone who has ever done a kind deed for us, or spoken one word of encouragement to us, has entered into the make-up of our character and of our thoughts, as well as our success.
Unless knowledge is transformed into wisdom, and wisdom is expressed in character; education is a wasteful process.
Character Education helps to create an environment for caring and learning in schools.
If human beings are perceived as potentials rather than problems, as possessing strengths instead of weaknesses, as unlimited rather that dull and unresponsive, then they thrive and grow to their capabilities.
The term Hispanic, coined by technomarketing experts and by the designers of political campaigns, homogenizes our cultural diversity (Chicanos, Cubans, and Puerto Ricans become indistinguishable), avoids our indigenous cultural heritage and links us directly with Spain. Worse yet, it possesses connotations of upward mobility and political obedience.
We are all part of the human family and we should be about doing what all good families do - caring for our less fortunate brothers and sisters.
We are a nation of communities... a brilliant diversity spread like stars, like a thousand points of light in a broad and peaceful sky.
Liberty will not descend to a people; a people must raise themselves to liberty; it is a blessing that must be earned before it can be enjoyed.
Have the courage to be ignorant of a great number of things, in order to avoid the calamity of being ignorant of everything.
Anyone can be a barbarian; it requires a terrible effort to remain a civilized man.
No society can long sustain itself unless its members have learned the sensitivities, motivations and skills involved in assisting and caring for other human beings.
Under capitalism everybody is the architect of his own fortune.
You can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those who can do nothing for him.
Every man must decide whether he will walk in the creative light of altruism or the darkness of destructive selfishness. This is the judgment. Life's persistent and most urgent question is 'What are you doing for others?'
Ours is supposed to be a government in which classes and distinctions melt into a harmonious whole. Until we reach this ideal of government, we will be a distracted, contentious people.
There aren't any great men. There are just great challenges that ordinary men like you and me are forced by circumstances to meet.
The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.
Watch your thoughts, they become words. Watch your words, they become actions. Watch your actions, they become habit.
I am lord of myself, accountable to none.
Intelligence plus character-that is the goal of true education.
Absolute liberty is absence of restraint; responsibility is restraint; therefore, the ideally free individual is responsible to himself.
Watch your character; it becomes your destiny.
The best index to a person's character is how he treats people who can't do him any good, and how he treats people who can't fight back.