“The gap between enthusiasm and indifference is filled with failures. The great man is he that does not lose his child’s heart.”

To feed men and not to love them is to treat them as if they were barnyard cattle. To love them and not respect them is to treat them as if they were household pets.

Kindly words do not enter so deeply into men as a reputation for kindness.

Men must be decided on what they will not do, and then they are able to act with vigor in what they ought to do.

When Heaven is about to confer a great office upon you, it first exercises your mind with suffering and your sinews and bones with toil.

All people have the common desire to be elevated in honour, but all people have something still more elevated in themselves without knowing it.

The best things in life come in threes, like friends, dreams, and memories.

Friendship is one mind in two bodies.

If the King loves music, it is well with the land.

He who wishes to be benevolent will not be rich.

The myriad things are complete in us. There is no greater joy than to reflect on ourselves and become sincere.

The foundation of the world lies in the nation. The foundation of the nation lies in the family. The foundation of the family lies in the individual.

He who exerts his mind to the utmost knows his nature.

The Way lies at hand yet it is sought afar off; the thing lies in the easy yet it is sought in the difficult.

Only when someone refuses to do certain things will he be capable of doing great things.

He who loves others is always loved by them, and he who respects others is always respected by them.

The regular path of virtue is to be pursued without any bend, and from no view to emolument.

I felt like there was something I needed to do – speaking to kids and sharing my story with them and helping them understand racism has no place in the minds and hearts of children.

Sooner strangle an infant in its cradle than nurse unacted desires.

It’s wrong for parents to bury their children. It should be the other way around.

Mama exhorted her children at every opportunity to ‘jump at the sun.’ We might not land on the sun, but at least we would get off the ground.

Most children turn out badly because they have the wrong parental image. This doesn’t mean their parents are criminal. It means they are boring and cruel.

Our very lives are dependent, for sustenance, on the sweat and sacrifice of the campesinos. Children of farm workers should be as proud of their parents’ professions as other children are of theirs.

Every time we sit at a table at night or in the morning to enjoy the fruits and grain and vegetables from our good earth, remember that they come from the work of men and women and children who have been exploited for generations.

But that was war. Just about all he could find in its favor was that it paid well and liberated children from the pernicious influence of their parents.