Quotations

Quotations help us remember the simple yet profound truths that give life perspective and meaning.  When it comes to life's most important lessons, we can all use gentle reminders.
                                         - Criswell Freeman

From the Heart

The ultimate test of a relationship is to disagree but to hold hands.

-Alexandra Penney

The worst prison would be a closed heart.

-Pope John Paul II

There are many things in life that will catch your eye. But only a few will catch your heart....

-Ben Crenshaw

Do all things with love.

-Og Mandino

Love is a great beautifier.
                              -Louisa May Alcott
Friendship is Love without his wings.
                               -Lord Byron
Love . . . the essence of God.
                                         -Ralph Waldo Emerson
Love is a fruit always in season and within reach of every hand.
                                         -Mother Teresa
Love is perhaps the only glimpse we are permitted of eternity.
                                         -Helen Hayes
Treasure the love you receive above all. It will survive long after your good health has vanished.

-Og Mandino

The only gift is a portion of thyself.
                                        -Ralph Waldo Emerson
Love is indestructible : Its holy flame for ever burneth; From Heaven it came, to Heaven it returneth.
                                        -Robert Southey
True love's the gift which God has given to man alone beneath the heaven.
                                        -Sir Walter Scott
It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.
                                        -Antoine De Saint-Exupery
It is wisdom to believe the heart.
                                        -George Santayana
What is lovely never dies, put passes into other loveliness.
                                        -Thomas Bailey Aldrich
Heat is required to forge anything. Every great accomplishment is the story of a flaming heart.

-Mary Lou Retton

Regarding Life

Each day is a little life.

-Schopenhauer

He is happiest who finds peace in his home.
                    -Goethe
We don't know who we are until we see what we can do.

-Martha Grimes

Until you make peace with who you are, you'll never be content with what you have.
                                        -Doris Mortman
Rather fail with honor than succeed by fraud.

-Sophocles

Those who bring sunshine to the lives of others cannot keep it from themselves.

-James Barrie

The greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions and not on our circumstances.
                                       -Martha Washington
I don't think of all the misery, but of all the beauty that still remains.
                                        -Anne Frank
When you look at your life, the greatest happinesses are family happinesses.
                                        -Dr. Joyce Brothers
Believe you can and you're halfway there.
                                        -Theodore Roosevelt
Life is like a mirror, we get the best results when we smile at it.
                                         -Unknown
The natural state of a human being is dignity.
                                        - Robert F. Kennedy
You may live longer than I do, but I will live more.
                                        -James McConnell
To accomplish great things we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe.

-Unknown

My life is my message.
                                         -Ghandi
Nothing can bring you peace but yourself. Nothing can bring you peace but the triumph of principles.
                                        -Ralph Waldo Emerson
Nonviolence is the supreme law of life.
                                        -Indian Proverb
Don't be afraid to fail. Don't waste energy trying to cover up failure. Learn from your failures
and go on to the next challenge. It's OK. If you're not failing, you're not growing.

-H. Stanley Judd

We can believe what we choose.  We ae answerable for what we choose to believe.
                                        -Cardinal Newman
Happiness is a direction, not a place.
                                        -Syndey J. Harris
Our life is frittered away by detail... Simplify, simplify.
                                        -Henry David Thoreau
Life is meant to be lived.
                                        -Eleanor Roosevelt
Adopt the pace of nature; her secret is patience.
                                         -Ralph Waldo Emerson
Children are apt to live up to what you believe of them.
                                          -Lady Bird Johnson
I ask you to judge me by the enemies I have made.
                                         -Franklin Delanor Roosevelt
All of the significant battles are waged within the self.

-Sheldon Kopp

It does not require many words to speak the truth.
                                         -Chief Joseph
People seldom improve when they have no other model but themselves to copy after.

-Goldsmith

Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm.
                                        -Ralph Waldo Emerson
When making your choice in life, do not neglect to live.
                                        -Samuel Johnson
Success must be continually practiced or it will take wings and fly away.
                                        -Kenneth Harmon
I can forgive, but I cannot forget, is only another way of saying, I will not forgive.
                                         -Henry Ward Beecher
Integrity is one of several paths, it distinguishes itself from the others because it is the right path,
and the only one upon which you will never get lost.

-M. H. McKee

Believe the best of everybody.
                                        -Rudyard Kipling
As a man thinketh so is he, and as a man chooseth, so is he.
                                        -Ralph Waldo Emerson
The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.

-Bart Forbes

Commitment is a line you must cross....it is the difference between dreaming and doing.

-Bernie Fuchs

The same fence that shuts others out shuts you in.

-Bill Copeland

Beauty is truth, truth beauty, - that is all ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.
                                        -John Keats
Our life is what our thoughts make it.
                                        -Marcus Aurelius
These are the times that try men's souls.
                                        -Thomas Paine
If you believe in the Lord, He will do half the work: the last half.
                                        -Cyrus Curtis
Ruthlessly compete with your own best self.
                                        -Apollo 13 engineers
Five great enemies of peace inhabit us: avarice, ambition, envy, anger and pride.
                                        -Ralph Waldo Emerson
Many of our disappointments and much of our unhappiness arise from our forming false notions of things and persons.
                                        -Abigail Adams
Most of the shadows of this life are caused by standing on one's own sunshine.
                                        -Ralph Waldo Emerson
Alter your life by altering your attitudes.
                                        -William James
We think in generalities, but we live in detail.
                                        -Alfred North Whitehead
There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so.
                                        -Shakespeare
Teachers open the door, but you must enter by yourself.
                                        -Chinese Proverb
No man walks with dignity whose step is rushed.
                                        -Anonymous
Write on your heart that every day is the best day of the year.
                                        -Ralph Waldo Emerson
Three Rules of Work: 1. Out of clutter, find simplicity.  2.  From discord, find harmony.
                                  3. In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.
                                        -Albert Einstein
Never take away hope from any human being.
                                        -Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
The mere sense of living is joy enough.
                                        -Emily Dickinson
In life, you can never do a kindness too soon because you never know how soon it will be too late.
                                        -Ralph Waldo Emerson
The cost of a thing is the amount of life that must be exchanged for it.
                                        -Henry David Thoreau
Life is painting a picture, not creating a sum.
                                        -Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
There is only one success - to be able to spend your life in your own way.
                                        -Christopher Morley
And there is no greatness where there is not simplicity, goodness and truth.
                                        -Leo Tolstoy
Life isn't a matter of milestones but of moments.
                                        Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy
If man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.
                                        -Henry David Thoreau
Go - not knowing where. Bring - not knowing what. The path is long, the way unknown.
                                        -Russian Fairy Tale
Try not to be a man of success, but rather try to be a man of value.
                                        -Albert Einstein
For of all sad words of tongue or pen, The saddest are these: "It might have been!"
                                        -John Greenleaf Whittier
Friendship with oneself is all important, because without it one cannot be friends with anyone else in the world.
                                        -Eleanor Roosevelt
It is impossible for a man to be cheated by anyone but himself.
                                        -Ralph Waldo Emerson
Every day is a good day.
                                        -Yun-Men
Thinking is more interesting than knowing, but less interesting than looking.
                                        -Goethe
A child educated only at school is an undereducated child.
                                        -George Santayana
The reason for idleness and crime is the deferring of our hopes.
                                        -Ralph Waldo Emerson
When one door closes, another opens, but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.
                                        -Alexander Graham Bell
Every exit is an entry somewhere else.
                                        -Tom Stoppard
How many cares one loses when one decides not to be something but to be someone.
                                        -Coco Chanel
No man is a failure who is enjoying life.
                                         -William Feather
Alas for those who never sing, but die with their music still in them.
                                        -Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.
Into each life some rain must fall.  Some days must be dark and dreary.
                                        -Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Only those who dare to fail miserably can achieve greatly.
                                        -Robert Kennedy
The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a person's determination.
                                        -Tommy Lasorda
In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert's mind there are few.
                                        -Shunryu Suzuki
Think you can, think you can't; either way you'll be right.
                                        -Henry Ford
Do the thing you fear, and the death of fear is certain.
                                        -Ralph Waldo Emerson
Restriction of free thought and free speech is the most dangerous of subversions.
                                        - William O. Douglas
Fear always springs from ignorance.
                                        -Ralph Waldo Emerson
When you get into a tight place, and it seems you can't go on, hold on, for that's just the place and time that the tide will turn.                                 -Harriet Beecher Stowe
Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us, or we find it not.
                                        -Ralph Waldo Emerson

The Lighter Side

If dandelions were hard to grow, they would be most welcome on any lawn.

-Andrew Mason

How old would you be if you didn't know how old you are?
                                         -Satchel Paige
If you feel happy, tell your face.
                                         -Steve Potter
You only live once - but if you work it right, once is enough.
                                         -Joe E. Lewis
When you have a choice and don't make it, that in itself is a choice.
                                         -William James
Hitch your wagon to a star.
                                          -Ralph Waldo Emerson
Attitudes are contagious.  Do you want people around you to catch yours?
                                         -Bob Moawad
Happiness is a perfume you can't pour on others without getting a few drops on yourself.
                                         -Ralph Waldo Emerson
We cannot do everything at once, but we can do something at once.
                                         -Calvin Coolidge
Never explain yourself: Your friends don't need it and your enemies won't believe it.
                                         -Unknown
Oh, the places you'll go, oh, the things you'll see.
                                         -Dr. Seuss
Knowledge and timber shouldn't be used until they are seasoned.
                                         -Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.
Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.
                                         -George Santayana
The human mind is like an umbrella - it functions best when open.
                                         -Walter Gropius
To ask the hard question is simple.
                                         -W.H. Auden
There must be more to life than having everything.
                                         -Maurice Sendak
Genius is but one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration.
                                         -Thomas Edison
I would rather be the man who bought the Brooklyn Bridge than the man who sold it.
                                         -Will Rogers
The first half of our lives are ruined by our parents, and the second half by our children.
                                          -Clarence Darrow
You can build a throne with bayonets, but you can't sit on it for long.
                                         -Boris Yeltsin
Humor makes all things tolerable.
                                         -Henry Ward Beecher
Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans.
                                         -John Lennon
The power of Thought, - the magic of the Mind!
                                         -Lord Byron
The landscape belongs to the man who looks at it.
                                         -Henry David Thoreau
A merry heart goes all the day, Your sad tires in a mile-a.
                                         -Shakespeare
In walking, just walk. In sitting, just sit. Above all, don't wobble.
                                         -Yun-Men
The best thing one can do when it's raining is let it rain.
                                         -Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Hope is a thing with feathers, that perches on the soul.
                                         -Emily Dickinson
Birds sing after a storm.  Why shouldn't we?
                                         -Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy
The fault-finder will find faults even in paradise.
                                         -Henry David Thoreau
What is required is sight and insight - then you might add one more:  excite.
                                         -Robert Frost
A friend my well be reckoned the masterpiece of nature.
                                         -Ralph Waldo Emerson
If you always do what interests you, at least one person is pleased.
                                         -Mother's Advice to Katharine Hepburn
I'm not young enough to know everything.
                                         -J.M. Barrie
Rose is a rose is a rose is a rose.
                                         -Gertrude Stein
Nothing is as hard to do gracefully as getting down off your high horse.
                                         -Frank Jones
Fall seven times, stand up eight.
                                         -Japanese proverb
There ain't no way to find out why a snorer can't hear himself snore.
                                         -Mark Twain
Character is much easier kept than recovered.
                                         -Thomas Paine
Wisdom lies in taking everything with good humor and a grain of salt.
                                         -George Santayana
Nothing I never said ever did me any harm.
                                         -Calvin Coolidge
If you don't paddle your own canoe, you don't move.
                                         -Katharine Hepburn
Sin has many tools, but a lie is the handle that fits them all.
                                         -Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
Don't talk unless you can improve the silence.
                                         -New England Saying
Goodwill is the one and only asset that competition cannot undersell or destroy.
                                         -Marshall Field
Do not act as if you had a thousand years to live.
                                          -Marcus Aurelius
Life can only be understood backward, but it must be lived forward.
                                          -Kierkegaard
It's not that life is one darn thing after another.  It's one darn thing over and over.
                                          -Edna St. Vincent Millay
When a dog runs at you, whistle for him.
                                         -Henry David Thoreau
Don't lose your head.  It's the best part of your body.
                                         -Jimmy Snyder
Your friend is the man who knows all about you, and still likes you.
                                         -Elbert Hubbard
If you don't like the weather in New England, just wait a few minutes.
                                         -Ring Lardner
I realize that a sense of humor isn't for everyone.  It's only for people who want to have fun, enjoy life, and feel alive.
                                         -Anne Wilson Schaef
We're all proud of making little mistakes. It gives us the feeling we don't make any big ones.

-Andrew A. Rooney

I have had more trouble with myself than with any other man I have ever met!

-Dwight L. Moody

To disagree, one doesn't have to be disagreeable.

-Barry M. Goldwater

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One may ask who is my favorite ........ why Ralph Waldo Emerson ...... and the reason - one of his quotes I read in 1978 actually started me on my quest of collecting quotations and gathering ideas for living my life:
.

What lies behind us

And what lies before us

Are tiny matters compared

To what lies within Us

Mr. Emerson believed each of us is gifted with a quiet, inner compass which is available whenever we muster the curiosity and courage to look inward for guidance.  An integral part of this inner journey depends upon one's attitude toward life.
As Emerson correctly observed, "A man is what he thinks about all day long."  If one looks for the best, one finds it.  If one seeks the worst, this becomes reality.  As you read  quotes or books consider this sobering truth:  The world in which you live must, over time, fit into the mold of  your own expectations.*

* The Book of New England Wisdom  compiled and Edited by Criswell Freeman; 1996 by Walnut Grove Press

"What Is Success"

by Ralph Waldo Emerson

To laugh often and much;

To win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children;

To earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends;

To appreciate beauty;

To find the best in others;

To leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition;

To know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived;

This is to have succeeded.