“The line between failure and success is so fine. . . that we are often on the line and do not know it.”

Chapters: 2. The Wordless Teachings

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“I would rather be able to appreciate things I cannot have than to have things I am not able to appreciate.”

Chapters: 23. Nothing and Not

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“It does not take much strength to do things, but it requires a great deal of strength to decide what to do.”

Chapters: 33. Know Yourself

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“The object of teaching a child is to enable him to get along without a teacher.”

Chapters: 38. Fruit Over Flowers

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“Constant effort and frequent mistakes are the stepping stones to genius.”

Chapters: 43. No Effort, No Trace

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“Little minds are interested in the extraordinary; great minds in the commonplace.”

Chapters: 45. Complete Perfection

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“It is easy to get everything you want, provided you first learn to do without the things you cannot get.”

Chapters: 46. Enough

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“The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one.”

Chapters: 47. Effortless Success

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“I do not read a book; I hold a conversation with the author.”

Chapters: 48. Unlearning

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“He who does not understand your silence will probably not understand your words.”

Chapters: 56. One with the Dust

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“It's a fine thing to have ability, but the ability to discover ability in others is the true test.”

Chapters: 62. Basic Goodness

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“Do not take life too seriously. You will never get out of it alive.”

Chapters: 63. Easy as Hard

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“The teacher is the one who gets the most out of the lessons, and the true teacher is the learner.”

Chapters: 65. Simplicity: the Hidden Power of Goodness

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“Men are only as great as they are kind and the only sin is to be unkind.”

from A Thosand and One Epigrams, 1911

Chapters: 67. Three Treasures

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“Never explain―your friends do not need it and your enemies will not believe you anyway.”

Chapters: 70. Inscrutable

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“A retentive memory may be a good thing, but the ability to forget is the true token of greatness.”

Chapters: 79. No Demands

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“One machine can do the work of fifty ordinary men. No machine can do the work of one extraordinary man.”

Chapters: 80. A Golden Age

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“We awaken in others the same attitude of mind we hold toward them.”

Chapters: 81. Journey Without Goal

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“"God will not look you over for medals, diplomas, or degrees – but for scars."”

from A Message to Garcia and Thirteen Other Things

Chapters: 18. The Sick Society

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“All good men are Anarchists… all just men are Anarchists. Jesus was an Anarchist.”

from A Message to Garcia and Thirteen Other Things

Chapters: 57. Wu Wei

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“Folks who never do any more than they get paid for, never get paid for any more than they do.”

Chapters: 79. No Demands

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“There is no failure except in no longer trying.”

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“The world is moving so fast these days that the man who says it can't be done is generally interrupted by someone doing it.”

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“This will never be a civilized country until we expend more money for books than we do for chewing gum.”

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“Optimism is a kind of heart stimulant—the digitalis of failure.”

from A Thosand and One Epigrams, 1911

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“A pessimist is a person who has been compelled to live with an optimist.”

from The Note Book, 1927

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“This is a busy world, and no one has time to sit right down and hate you. The only enemies we have are those we conjure up ourselves. The idea that we have enemies is only egotism gone to seed.”

from A Thosand and One Epigrams, 1911

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“If you lend a willing ear to someone's troubles, you make them your own. You do not lessen theirs.”

from A Thosand and One Epigrams, 1911

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“Judges demand precedent to keep in line with public opinion. But since public opinion is constantly changing, precedent is the one thing they should avoid.”

from A Thosand and One Epigrams, 1911

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“When we remember that some of the best and noblest men that ever lived have been reviled, indicted, and executed by so-called good men, how can we believe stories that revile and discredit anyone?”

from A Thosand and One Epigrams, 1911

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“Follow your spontaneous inspiration above all gaining ideas. The world will either honor or hate you—the difference is small.”

from A Thosand and One Epigrams, 1911

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“A woman can defend her virtue from men much more easily than she can protect her reputation from women.”

from A Thosand and One Epigrams, 1911

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“Punishment should fit the criminal, not the crime.”

from A Thosand and One Epigrams, 1911

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“Those who say, 'Money isn't everything' probably can't pay their rent.”

from A Thosand and One Epigrams, 1911

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“This will never be a civilized country until we spend more money for books than we do for chewing gum.”

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“A man alone is only half a man—it takes both a man and a woman to complete the circuit... sublime thoughts and great deeds are the children of married minds.”

from A Thosand and One Epigrams, 1911

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“Success is a constant sense of discontent broken by brief periods of satisfaction from a challenging accomplishment.”

from A Thosand and One Epigrams, 1911

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“Men do not lack strength; they lack the will to concentrate and act... Success is voltage under control”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“Abolish fear and you can accomplish whatever your wish.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“the worst part about making a soldier of a man is not that a soldier kills, but that the soldier loses his own soul.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“the aggressor is overcome by the poison of his pride; victory is only another name for defeat; but the Spirit of Gentleness and Truth is eternal.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“The Divine Economy is automatic and very simple: we receive only that which we give.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“The goal of evolution is self-conquest.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

Chapters: 8. The Highest Realization

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“Most poets die young, not because the gods especially love them, but because life is a bank account and to wipe out our balance is to have your checks bounce. The excesses of youth are drafts payable at maturity.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“If pleasures are greatest in anticipation, just remember that this is also true of trouble.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“All wrong recoils upon the doer, and the man who makes wrong statements about others is himself to be pitied, not the man he vilifies.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“of all the illusions that beset mankind, none is quite so curious a that tendency to suppose that we are mentally and morally superior to those who differ from us in opinion.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“Men who are threatened usually die of old age.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“The original mind is what counts—most people are merely echoes.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“The man who makes the deepest notches on the Stick of Time is not usually preceded by a brass band.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“Great and wise men have ever loved laughter. The vain, the ignorant, the dishonest, the pretentious, alone have dreaded or despised it.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“Get rid of your regrets. You are what you are because of what you've experienced. And rightly understood and accepted, all experiences are good, bitter ones best of all.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“There is a whole round of maladies that can be cured by a new thought, a new sensation, new surroundings. A little excitement or a new experience often clears the cobwebs from the brain.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“To civilize mankind: make marriage difficult and divorce easy.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“There was one who thought himself above me, and he was above me until he had that thought.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“Wisdom does not consist in banishing passion, but in purifying it.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“New Thought offers you no promise of paradise or eternal bliss... All it offers is unending work, constant effort, new difficulties; beyond each success is a new trial.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“God looked upon His work and saw that it was good. That is where the clergy take issue with Him.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“Civilization: the matter of wearing your shirt in the confines of your trousers.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“If your religion does not change you, then you had better change your religion.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“Polygamy: an endeavor to get more out of life than there is in it.”

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“An idea that is not dangerous is unworthy to be called an idea at all.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“When men and women meet only to lovey-dovey, society is essentially barbaric; and where the males monopolize, or think, or pretend to think, that they monopolize wisdom, there is small hope for progress.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“When a Socialist starts a restaurant and begins to prosper, his Socialistic zeal begins to lukewarm and his comrades go into mourning for him as for one who is dead. Give us this day our daily work.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“If you would have friends, be one.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“99 men out of 100 in a civilized countries are opposed to war. We recognize that life is short and the night cometh. Leave us alone!”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“There is no doubt that a teacher—once committed to a certain line of thought—will cling to that line long after all others have deserted it. In trying to convince others, he convinces himself.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“Medical advertisements are not to let you know the disease is curable, but to make you think you have it.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“No one wins his greatest fame in that to which he has given most of his time; it's the side issue, the thing he does for recreation, his heart's play-spell that gives him immortality.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“Business is done only where there is enthusiasm. Without good cheer, firm faith in the future and in your fellow-men, you are only a candidate for the Down-and-Out Club.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“Don't be a villager—be universal, no matter where you live.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“I pray that I may never meddle, dictate, interfere, give advice that is not wanted, nor assist when my services are not needed. If I can help people, I will do it by giving them a chance to help themselves”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“O God! we thank Thee that Thou hast given us faults and thereby made us men.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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“We are not punished for our sins, but by them.”

from A Thousand and One Epigrams

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