John Lancaster Spalding Quotations

A Wise man knows that much of what he says and does is commonplace and trivial. His thoughts are not all solemn and sacred in his own eyes. He is able to laugh at himself and is not offended when others make him a subject whereon to exercise their wit.

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.

Base thy life on principle, not on rules.

It is not difficult to grasp and express thoughts that float on the stream of current opinion: but to think and rightly utter what is permanently true and interesting, what shall appeal to the best minds a thousand years hence, as it appeals to them to-day, this is the work of genius.

The doctrine of the utter vanity of life is a doctrine of despair, and life is hope.

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

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.

We are not masters of the truth which is borne in upon us: it overpowers us.

If we are disappointed that men give little heed to what we utter is it for their sake or our own?

To cultivate the memory we should confide to it only what we understand and love: the rest is a useless burden; for simply to know by rote is not to know at all.

We have no sympathy with those who are controlled by ideas and passions which we neither understand nor feel. Thus they who live to satisfy the appetites do not believe it possible to live in and for the soul.

The zest of life lies in right doing, not in the garnered harvest.

When we have not the strength or the courage to grasp a new truth, we persuade ourselves that it is not a truth at all.

Those subjects have the greatest educational value, which are richest in incentives to the noblest self-activity.

If ancient descent could confer nobility, the lower forms of life would possess it in a greater degree than man.

When we know and love the best we are content to lack the approval of the many.

Unless we consent to lack the common things which men call success, we shall hardly become heroes or saints, philosophers or poets.

If thy words are wise, they will not seem so to the foolish: if they are deep the shallow will not appreciate them. Think not highly of thyself, then, when thou art praised by many.

If thou wouldst be interesting, keep thy personality in the background, and be great and strong in and through thy subject.

We may avoid much disappointment and bitterness of soul by learning to understand how little necessary to our joy and peace are the things the multitude most desire and seek.

If there are but few who interest thee, why shouldst thou be disappointed if but few find thee interesting?

The will the one thing it is most important to educate we neglect.

The common man is impelled and controlled by interests; the superior, by ideas.

The aim of education is to strengthen and multiply the powers and activities of the mind rather than to increase its possessions.

As we can not love what is hateful, let us accustom ourselves neither to think nor to speak of disagreeable things and persons.

There are who mistake the spirit of pugnacity for the spirit of piety, and thus harbor a devil instead of an angel.

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

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.

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

To learn the worth of a man's religion, do business with him.

Our prejudices are like physical infirmities — we cannot do what they prevent us from doing.

If I am not pleased with myself, but should wish to be other than I am, why should I think highly of the influences which have made me what I am?

Whoever has freed himself from envy and bitterness may begin to try to see things as they are.

As memory may be a paradise from which we cannot be driven, it may also be a hell from which we cannot escape.

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.

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.

The teacher does best, not when he explains, but when he impels his pupils to seek themselves the explanation.

The lover of education labors first of all to educate himself.

Altruism is a barbarism. Love is the word.

If we learn from those only, of whose lives and opinions we altogether approve, we shall have to turn from many of the highest and profoundest minds.

The noblest are they who turning from the things the vulgar crave, seek the source of a blessed life in worlds to which the senses do not lead.

Break not the will of the young, but guide it to right ends.

If science were nothing more than the best means of teaching the love of the simple fact, the indispensable need of verification, of careful and accurate observation and statement, its value would be of the highest order.

Language should be pure, noble and graceful, as the body should be so: for both are vestures of the Soul.

The first requisite of a gentleman is to be true, brave and noble, and to be therefore a rebuke and scandal to venal and vulgar souls.

There are faults which show heart and win hearts, while the virtue in which there is no love, repels.

The doubt of an earnest, thoughtful, patient and laborious mind is worthy of respect. In such doubt may be found indeed more faith than in half the creeds.

Reform the world within thyself, which is thy proper world.

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

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

As our power over others increases, we become less free; for to retain it, we must make ourselves its servants.

If thou wouldst be implacable, be so with thyself.

Make thyself perfect; others, happy.

They who can no longer unlearn have lost the power to learn.

Be suspicious of your sincerity when you are the advocate of that upon which your livelihood depends.

The study of science, dissociated from that of philosophy and literature, narrows the mind and weakens the power to love and follow the noblest ideals: for the truths which science ignores and must ignore are precisely those which have the deepest bearing on life and conduct.

It is the business of the teacher ... to fortify reason and to make conscience sovereign.

When we have attained success, we see how inferior it is to the hope, yearning and enthusiasm with which we started forth in life's morning.

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.

The world is chiefly a mental fact. From mind it receives the forms of time and space, the principle of casuality[sic], color, warmth, and beauty. Were there no mind, there would be no world.

He who leaves school, knowing little, but with a longing for knowledge, will go farther than one who quits, knowing many things, but not caring to learn more.

The innocence which is simply ignorance is not virtue.

Where it is the chief aim to teach many things, little education is given or received.

In education, as in religion and love, compulsion thwarts the purpose for which it is employed.

If we fail to interest, whether because we are dull and heavy, or because our hearers are so, we teach in vain.

They whom trifles distract and nothing occupies are but children.

It is a common error to imagine that to be stirring and voluble in a worthy cause is to be good and to do good.

When one sense has been bribed the others readily bear false witness.

What we think out for ourselves forms channels in which other thoughts will flow.

If thy friends tire of thee, remember that it is human to tire of everything.

A principal aim of education is to give students a taste for literature, for the books of life and power, and to accomplish this, it is necessary that their minds be held aloof from the babblement and discussions of the hour, that they may accustom themselves to take interest in the words and deeds of the greatest men, and so make themselves able and worthy to shape a larger and nobler future; but if their hours of leisure are spent over journals and reviews, they will, in later years, become the helpless victims of the newspaper habit.

The highest strength is acquired not in overcoming the world, but in overcoming one's self. Learn to be cruel to thyself, to withstand thy appetites, to bear thy sufferings, and thou shalt become free and able.

Say not thou lackest talent. What talent had any of the greatest, but passionate faith in the efficacy of work?

The common prejudice against philosophy is the result of the incapacity of the multitude to deal with the highest problems.

We are made ridiculous less by our defects than by the affectation of qualities which are not ours.

Nothing requires so little mental effort as to narrate or follow a story. Hence everybody tells stories and the readers of stories outnumber all others.

To secure approval one must remain within the bounds of conventional mediocrity. Whatever lies beyond, whether it be greater insight and virtue, or greater stolidity and vice, is condemned. The noblest men, like the worst criminals, have been done to death.

If our opinions rest upon solid ground, those who attack them do not make us angry, but themselves ridiculous.

Folly will run its course and it is the part of wisdom not to take it too seriously.

To think profoundly, to seek and speak truth, to love justice and denounce wrong is to draw upon one's self the ill will of many.

We shrink from the contemplation of our dead bodies, forgetting that when dead they are no longer ours, and concern us as little as the hairs that have fallen from our heads.

Exercise of body and exercise of mind are supplementary, and both may be made recreative and educative.

If thou wouldst help others deal with them as though they were what they should be

Solitude is unbearable for those who can not bear themselves.

Worry, whatever its source, weakens, takes away courage, and shortens life.

A liberal education is that which aims to develop faculty without ulterior views of profession or other means of gaining a livelihood. It considers man an end in himself and not an instrument whereby something is to be wrought. Its ideal is human perfection.

Do definite good; first of all to yourself, then to definite persons.

If all were gentle and contented as sheep, all would be as feeble and helpless.

Leave each one his touch of folly; it helps to lighten life's burden which, if he could see himself as he is, might be too heavy to carry.

Agitators and declaimers may heat the blood, but they do not illumine the mind.

Be watchful lest thou lose the power of desiring and loving what appeals to the soul this is the miser's curse this the chain and ball the sensualist drags.

Liberty is more precious than money or office; and we should be vigilant lest we purchase wealth or place at the price of inner freedom.

The study of law is valuable as a mental discipline, but the practice of pleading tends to make one petty, formal, and insincere. To be driven to look to legality rather than to equity blurs the view of truth and justice.

To view an object in the proper light we must stand away from it. The study of the classical literatures gives the aloofness which cultivates insight. In learning to live with peoples and civilizations that have long ceased to be alive, we gain a vantage point, acquire an enlargement and elevation of thought, which enable us to study with a more impartial and liberal mind the condition of the society around us.

Contradiction is the salt which keeps truth from corruption

As children must have the hooping cough, the college youth must pass through the stage of conceit in which he holds in slight esteem the wisdom of the best.

A hobby is the result of a distorted view of things. It is putting a planet in the place of a sun.