John Lancaster Spalding

The world is a mirror into which we look, and see our own image.

We may outgrow the things of children, without acquiring sense and relish for those which become a man.

The genius is childlike. Like children he looks into the world as into a new creation and finds there a perennial source of wonder and delight.

Drunkards and sensualists have become heroes and saints; but sluggards have never risen to the significance and worth of human beings. Sloth enfeebles the root of life, and degrades more surely, if less swiftly, than the sins of passion.

If thou need money, get it in an honest way—by keeping books, if thou wilt, but not by writing books.

The writers who accomplish most are those who compel thought on the highest and most profoundly interesting subjects.

In our thrifty populations of merchants, manufacturers, politicians, and professional men, there is little sense for beauty, little pure thought, little genuine culture; but they are prosperous and self-satisfied.

To clothe truth in fitting words is to feel a satisfaction like that which comes of doing good deeds.

The important thing is how we know, not what or how much.

Friends humor and flatter us, they steal our time, they encourage our love of ease, they make us content with ourselves, they are the foes of our virtue and our glory.

As the visit of one we love makes the whole day pleasant, so is it illumined and made fair by a brave and beautiful thought.

No sooner does a divine gift reveal itself in youth or maid than its market value becomes the decisive consideration, and the poor young creatures are offered for sale, as we might sell angels who had strayed among us.

We have lost the old love of work, of work which kept itself company, which was fair weather and music in the heart, which found its reward in the doing, craving neither the flattery of vulgar eyes nor the gold of vulgar men.

God has not made a world which suits all; how shall a sane man expect to please all?

Taste, of which the proverb says there should be no dispute, is precisely the subject which needs discussion.

Though what we accept be true, it is a prejudice unless we ourselves have considered and understood why and how it is true.

It is unpleasant to turn back, though it be to take the right way.

When the mind has grasped the matter, words come like flowers at the call of spring.

Thy money, thy office, thy reputation are nothing; put away these phantom clothings, and stand like an athlete stripped for the battle.

Passion is begotten of passion, and it easily happens, as with the children of great men, that the base is the offspring of the noble.

The fields and the flowers and the beautiful faces are not ours, as the stars and the hills and the sunlight are not ours, but they give us fresh and happy thoughts.|

Few know the joys that spring from a disinterested curiosity. It is like a cheerful spirit that leads us through worlds filled with what is true and fair, which we admire and love because it is true and fair.

In the world of thought a man’s rank is determined, not by his average work, but by his highest achievement.

The test of the worth of work is its effect on the worker. If it degrade him, it is bad; if it ennoble him, it is good.