“When Thomas Edison’s factory burned to the ground in 1914, destroying one-of-a-kind prototypes and causing $23 million in damage, Edison’s response was simple:
"Thank goodness all our mistakes were burned up. Now we can start fresh again.”
―
Thomas A. Edison
“Just because something doesn't do what you planned it to do doesn't mean it's useless.”
―
Thomas A. Edison
“We often miss opportunity because it's dressed in overalls and looks like work”
―
Thomas A. Edison
“There is no expedient to which a man will not go to avoid the real labor of thinking.”
―
Thomas A. Edison
“So far as the religion of the day is concerned, it is a damned fake ... Religion is all bunk.”
―
Thomas A. Edison
“I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.”
―
Thomas A. Edison
“Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.”
―
Thomas A. Edison
“Being busy does not always mean real work. The object of all work is production or accomplishment and to either of these ends there must be forethought, system, planning, intelligence, and honest purpose, as well as perspiration. Seeming to do is not doing”
―
Thomas A. Edison
“I have friends in overalls whose friendship I would not swap for the favor of the kings of the world.”
―
Thomas A. Edison
“The three great essentials to achieve anything worthwhile are, first, hard work; second, stick-to-itiveness; third, common sense.”
―
Thomas A. Edison
“There are no rules here -- we're trying to accomplish something.”
―
Thomas A. Edison
“I am not discouraged, because every wrong attempt discarded is another step forward.”
―
Thomas A. Edison
“I have always regarded Paine as one of the greatest of all Americans. Never have we had a sounder intelligence in this republic ... It was my good fortune to encounter Thomas Paine's works in my boyhood ... it was, indeed, a revelation to me to read that great thinker's views on political and theological subjects. Paine educated me, then, about many matters of which I had never before thought. I remember, very vividly, the flash of enlightenment that shone from Paine's writings, and I recall thinking, at that time, 'What a pity these works are not today the schoolbooks for all children!' My interest in Paine was not satisfied by my first reading of his works. I went back to them time and again, just as I have done since my boyhood days.”
―
Thomas A. Edison
“Five percent of the people think;
ten percent of the people think they think;
and the other eighty-five percent would rather die than think.”
―
Thomas A. Edison
“We will make electricity so cheap that only the rich will burn candles.”
―
Thomas A. Edison
