A man’s as miserable as he thinks he is.

Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it.

Metaphysics means nothing but an unusually obstinate effort to think clearly.

Fanatics are picturesque, mankind would rather see gestures than listen to reasons.

What’s real freedom? Real freedom is being able to not have my way and still be just as happy as if I did.

What sunshine is to flowers, smiles are to humanity. These are but trifles, to be sure; but scattered along life’s pathway, the good they do is inconceivable.

What really raises one’s indignation against suffering is not suffering intrinsically, but the senselessness of suffering.

The heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing.

Things are as they are. Looking out into it the universe at night, we make no comparisons between right and wrong stars, nor between well and badly arranged constellations.

Life is neither good or evil, but only a place for good and evil.

There is something curiously boring about somebody else’s happiness.

I look upon death to be as necessary to our constitution as sleep. We shall rise refreshed in the morning.

Error is always more busy than truth.

Every person takes the limits of their own field of vision for the limits of the world.

A belief in hell and the knowledge that every ambition is doomed to frustration at the hands of a skeleton have never prevented the majority of human beings from behaving as though death were no more than an unfounded rumor.

Every day that is born into the world comes like a burst of music and rings the whole day through, and you make of it a dance, a dirge, or a life march, as you will.

As long as your body is healthy and under control and death is distant, try to save your soul; when death is immanent what can you do?

Men can only be happy when they do not assume that the object of life is happiness.

Nothing in the universe is contingent, but all things are conditioned to exist and operate in a particular manner by the necessity of the divine nature.

In the fight between you and the world, back the world.

I don’t like to commit myself about heaven and hell – you see, I have friends in both places.

We are sinful not only because we have eaten of the Tree of Knowledge, but also because we have not yet eaten of the Tree of Life. The state in which we are is sinful, irrespective of guilt.

We need to internalize this idea of excellence. Not many folks spend a lot of time trying to be excellent.

A flippant, frivolous man may ridicule others, may controvert them, scorn them; but he who has any respect for himself seems to have renounced the right of thinking meanly of others.

We do not need to proselytise either by our speech or by our writing. We can only do so really with our lives. Let our lives be open books for all to study.

We are doomed to cling to a life even while we find it unendurable.

Movies are fun, but they are no cure for cancer.

Self-talk, for me, has been the biggest thing in my life. A lot of us have a dialogue that is crap. It’s a crappy dialogue. We live in a world right now that is very external. Everything is very on the surface. Superficial. Everything. And what we’re telling ourselves is what we see on TV.

The way up and the way down are one and the same.

Man and animals are in reality vehicles and conduits of food, tombs of animals, hostels of Death, coverings that consume, deriving life by the death of others.

To the wise, life is a problem; to the fool, a solution.

Whatever you believe with feeling becomes your reality.

A lot of people have it a lot worse than you do.

I’m sorry, it’s true. Having children really changes your view on these things. We’re born, we live for a brief instant, and we die. It’s been happening for a long time. Technology is not changing it much – if at all.

It seems like a lot of people seek their peace in things. And most of us are not even satisfied with the things we have… we always want more.

If you want to be enthusiastic, act enthusiastic.

People who pity themselves think, ‚Why would I try to do anything? I’ll just fail.‘

Such is the state of life, that none are happy but by the anticipation of change: the change itself is nothing; when we have made it, the next wish is to change again.

Marriage and family are ordained of God. The family is the most important social unit in time and in eternity. Under God’s great plan of happiness, families can be sealed in temples and be prepared to return to dwell in His holy presence forever. That is eternal life!

The life which men praise and regard as successful is but one kind. Why should we exaggerate any one kind at the expense of the others?

Good is positive. Evil is merely privative, not absolute: it is like cold, which is the privation of heat. All evil is so much death or nonentity. Benevolence is absolute and real. So much benevolence as a man hath, so much life hath he.

Beyond a doubt truth bears the same relation to falsehood as light to darkness.

All difficult things have their origin in that which is easy, and great things in that which is small.

The size of your success is measured by the strength of your desire; the size of your dream; and how you handle disappointment along the way.

It’s in responsibility that most people find the meaning that sustains them through life. It’s not in happiness. It’s not in impulsive pleasure.

The more you seek security, the less of it you have. But the more you seek opportunity, the more likely it is that you will achieve the security that you desire.

In the affairs of this world, men are saved not by faith, but by the want of it.

Europe was created by history. America was created by philosophy.

No great artist ever sees things as they really are. If he did, he would cease to be an artist.

Don’t let the incidents which take place in life bring you low. And certainly don’t whine. You can be brought low, that’s OK, but don’t be reduced by them. Just say, ‚That’s life.‘

If a man could have half of his wishes, he would double his troubles.

Those who hope for no other life are dead even for this.

I’ve always felt heroic about my life… As a child, I remember little girls in the playground moaning about how boys could do more than they could. I didn’t think that was the case at all. My parents didn’t treat me as a girl.

Premature certainty is the enemy of the truth.

Humans are amphibians – half spirit and half animal. As spirits they belong to the eternal world, but as animals they inhabit time.

I continuously go further and further learning about my own limitations, my body limitation, psychological limitations. It’s a way of life for me.

There is no logical way to the discovery of these elemental laws. There is only the way of intuition, which is helped by a feeling for the order lying behind the appearance.

What was God doing before the divine creation?

Pessimism leads to weakness, optimism to power.

So act that your principle of action might safely be made a law for the whole world.

A sincere and steadfast co-operation in promoting such a reconstruction of our political system as would provide for the permanent liberty and happiness of the United States.