“Liberty is not collective, it is personal. All liberty is individual liberty.”

We are too solicitous for government intervention, on the theory, first, that the people themselves are helpless, and second, that the Government has superior capacity for action. Often times both of these conclusions are wrong.

A government which lays taxes on the people not required by urgent public necessity and sound public policy is not a protector of liberty, but an instrument of tyranny. It condemns the citizen to servitude.

I have found it advisable not to give too much heed to what people say when I am trying to accomplish something of consequence. Invariably they proclaim it can’t be done. I deem that the very best time to make the effort.

What men owe to the love and help of good women can never be told.

You can display no greater wisdom than by resisting proposals for needless legislation. It is much more important to kill bad bills than to pass good ones.

The attempt to regulate, control, and prescribe all manner of conduct and social relations is very old. It was always the practice of primitive people.

Governments do not make ideals, but ideals make governments.

One of the greatest favors that can be bestowed upon the American people is economy in government.

Economy is the method by which we prepare today to afford the improvements of tomorrow.

Doubters do not achieve; skeptics do not contribute; cynics do not create.

Never go out to meet trouble. If you just sit still, nine cases out of ten, someone will intercept it before it reaches you.

There have been great men with little of what we call education. There have been many small men with a great deal of learning. There has never been a great people who did not possess great learning.

We cannot permit any inquisition either within or without the law or apply any religious test to the holding of office. The mind of America must be forever free.

Freedom is not only bought with a great price; it is maintained by unremitting effort.

The most common commodity in this country is unrealized potential.

No matter what anyone may say about making the rich and the corporations pay taxes, in the end they come out of the people who toil.

Am I so tied to a body and senses that I am incapable of existing without them?

Being real is effortless, my child, because it means we’ve embraced exactly who we are.

To become self-educated you should condemn yourself for all those things that you would criticize others.

Three things are necessary for the salvation of man: to know what he ought to believe; to know what he ought to desire; and to know what he ought to do.

Toil and risk are the price of glory, but it is a lovely thing to live with courage and die leaving an everlasting fame.

When my casket is being carried to the grave, leave my hands hanging outside. For empty-handed, I came into this world and empty-handed, I shall go!

For I found myself embarrassed with so many doubts and errors that it seemed to me that the effort to instruct myself had no effect other than the increasing discovery of my own ignorance

Have the courage to laugh in the places you have cried.