All quotes

It is in vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquillity: they must have action; and they will make it if they cannot find it.

But let me not hate and despise myself too much for these feelings; I know them to be wrong—that is a great step gained; I shall strive to overcome them.

Every failed experiment is one step closer to success.

You hang around a barbershop long enough—sooner or later you will get a haircut.

In our sorrow we see the rough side of the stuff; in our joys the smooth; and who shall say that when the taffeta is turned the most silk may not be in the sorrows?

Once I wished not to live, but the faculty of life seems to have sprung up in me again, from under the crushing foot of heavy grief.

The time for renewed action was coming, and though our situation was grave enough, we were facing the future hopefully.

One should always follow a denial with an affirmation.

Sometimes we will be rising toward the heights--then all will seem to reverse itself and start downward.

My fellow Americans, our long national nightmare is over.

I can say with conviction that the struggle which evil necessitates is one of the greatest blessings. It makes us strong, patient, helpful men and women.

A man must understand evil and be acquainted with sorrow before he can write himself an optimist and expect others to believe that he has reason for the faith that is in him.

I am never discouraged by absence of good. I never can be argued into hopelessness.

It lets us into the soul of things and teaches us that although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it.

Once I knew the depth where no hope was, and darkness lay on the face of all things.

Had it not been for the persistent encouragement of Miss Sullivan, I think I should have given up trying to write altogether.

But I did not dream that that interview would be the door through which I should pass from darkness into light, from isolation to friendship, companionship, knowledge, love.

I slip back many times, I fall, I stand still, I run against the edge of hidden obstacles, I lose my temper and find it again and keep it better, I trudge on, I gain a little, I feel encouraged, I get more eager and climb higher and begin to see the widening horizon.

Courage returns as we gaze; when we see what has been, we doubt no more that it can be again.

Though my life is low, if my spirit looks upward habitually at an elevated angle, it is as it were redeemed.

In spite of failures, cooperative schemes went on, some of the same men appearing in one after another with irrepressible optimism.

Keenly conscious of the social confusion all about us and the hard economic struggle, we at times believed that the very struggle itself might become a source of strength.

There are some days when we need a hand. There are other days when we're called on to lend one.

The result was that I gradually, but completely, emerged from my habitual depression, and was never again subject to it.

Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding.