In our thrifty populations of merchants, manufacturers, politicians, and professional men, there is little sense for beauty, little pure thought, little genuine culture; but they are prosperous and self-satisfied.
John Lancaster Spalding
When with all thy heart thou strivest to live with truth and love, couldst thou do anything better?.. If this be thy life, thou shalt not deem it a misfortune to lack the things men most crave and toil for.
life misfortune men truth
The weak, when they have authority, surround themselves with the weak. It is, indeed, a vice of rulers that men who have exceptional ability and worth are offensive to them, since they whose greatness is due to their position find it difficult to love those whom inner power makes great.
vices worth ability greatness men power
To think of education as a means of preserving institutions however excellent, is to have a superficial notion of its end and purpose, which is to mould and fashion men who are more than institutions, who create, outgrow, and re-create them.
purpose men theend education
To secure approval one must remain within the bounds of conventional mediocrity. Whatever lies beyond, whether it be greater insight and virtue, or greater stolidity and vice, is condemned. The noblest men, like the worst criminals, have been done to death.
vices virtues men death
culture men beauty self
Unless we consent to lack the common things which men call success, we shall hardly become heroes or saints, philosophers or poets.
heroes men success
We have lost the old love of work, of work which kept itself company, which was fair weather and music in the heart, which found its reward in the doing, craving neither the flattery of vulgar eyes nor the gold of vulgar men.
work men music
When guests enter the room their entertainers rise to receive them; and in all meetings men should ascend into their higher selves, imparting to one another only the best they know and love.
meeting men
Passion is begotten of passion, and it easily happens, as with the children of great men, that the base is the offspring of the noble.
men
Whom little things occupy and keep busy, are little men.
They who admire and reverence noble and heroic men are akin to them.
Great deeds and utterances are now so diluted with printer's ink that we can no longer find a sage or saint. Our worthiest men are exhibited and bewritten until they are made as uninteresting as clowns.
deeds men
If we are disappointed that men give little heed to what we utter is it for their sake or our own?
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