“What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight; build it anyway.”

“One day we will learn that the heart can never be totally right when the head is totally wrong”

“‎Surround yourself only with those who will lift you higher.”

“What should you pray about? Everything! Here’s a simple rule: If it’s worth worrying about, then it is worth praying about. If you prayed as much as you worry, you would have a whole lot less to worry about.”

“It is said an Eastern monarch once charged his wise men to invent him a sentence to be ever in view, and which should be true and appropriate in all times and situations. They presented him the words, "And this too, shall pass away." How much it expresses! How chastening in the hour of pride! How consoling in the depths of affliction!”

“The main objects of all science, the freedom and happiness of man. . . . [are] the sole objects of all legitimate government.

“Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience’s sake.”

“Yes. Oh no! I don't subject myself to a leadership that does not break new territories! It is the job of leadership to succeed in landing its limbs on new grounds.”

“To your request of my opinion of the manner in which a newspaper should be conducted, so as to be most useful, I should answer, ‘by restraining it to true facts & sound principles only.’ Yet I fear such a paper would find few subscribers. It is a melancholy truth, that a suppression of the press could not more compleatly deprive the nation of its benefits, than is done by its abandoned prostitution to falsehood. Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle. The real extent of this state of misinformation is known only to those who are in situations to confront facts within their knolege with the lies of the day. I really look with commiseration over the great body of my fellow citizens, who, reading newspapers, live & die in the belief, that they have known something of what has been passing in the world in their time; whereas the accounts they have read in newspapers are just as true a history of any other period of the world as of the present, except that the real names of the day are affixed to their fables. General facts may indeed be collected from them, such as that Europe is now at war, that Bonaparte has been a successful warrior, that he has subjected a great portion of Europe to his will, &c., &c.; but no details can be relied on. I will add, that the man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them; inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods & errors. He who reads nothing will still learn the great facts, and the details are all false.” —Letter to John Norvell, 14 June 1807 [Works 10:417--18]” 

“Pure gold does not rust. Only gold alloys do so. You may have golden dreams. But if you go in the company of toxic people, your become "a gold alloy" and what that means is that you can rust at any time!”

“Measured against eternity, our time on earth is just a blink of an eye...”

“successful people make right decisions early and manage those decisions daily.”

“All joy... emphasizes our pilgrim status; always reminds, beckons, awakens desire. Our best havings are wantings.”

“God usually meets us at our level of expectancy. That’s why, in many ways, your expectations will set the boundaries for your life. Jesus said, “According to your faith . . . be it done to you.”