“Though ambition in itself is a vice, yet it is often the parent of virtues.”

When defeat is inevitable, it is wisest to yield.

Our minds are like our stomaches; they are whetted by the change of their food, and variety supplies both with fresh appetite.

Though ambition may be a fault in itself, it is often the mother of virtues.

In almost everything, experience is more valuable than precept.

To my mind the boy who gives least promise is one in whom the critical faculty develops in advance of the imagination.

It is worth while too to warn the teacher that undue severity in correcting faults is liable at times to discourage a boy’s mind from effort.

For it would have been better that man should have been born dumb, nay, void of all reason, rather than that he should employ the gifts of Providence to the destruction of his neighbor.

Usage is the best language teacher.

A Woman who is generous with her money is to be praised; not so, if she is generous with her person.

Suffering itself does less afflict the senses than the apprehension of suffering.

By writing quickly we are not brought to write well, but by writing well we are brought to write quickly.

Although virtue receives some of its excellencies from nature, yet it is perfected by education.

The pretended admission of a fault on our part creates an excellent impression.

A liar ought to have a good memory.

Verse satire indeed is entirely our own.

It is easier to do many things than to do one thing continuously for a long time.

Before you get married you should meet your fiance’s parents. It is not enough that you like his parole officer.

When I read the epitaphs of the beautiful, every inordinate desire goes out; when I meet with the grief of parents upon a tombstone, my heart melts with compassion; when I see the tomb of the parents themselves,

I get over a hundred letters a day from all over the world, from children and parents, and it’s a wonder I ever have time to write books, let alone speak!

I thank God that I’m a product of my parents. That they infected me with their intelligence and energy for life, with their thirst for knowledge and their love. I’m grateful that I know where I come from.

Gerard and I pretty much share all parenting responsibilities, although I’m definitely the disciplinarian.

So I had to figure out for myself what was right and true. It was a search. It was a process. It drew on the moral sense that I’d learned from my parents, and in church, and in my own heart, and led me on my own journey of discovery.

People lose their minds, trying to prove their parental worth by getting their children into one of five colleges; when there are thousands of good colleges across the United States – and elsewhere.

Sadie,” he said forlornly, “when you become a parent, you may understand this. One of my hardest jobs as a father, one of my greatest duties, was to realize that my own dreams, my own goals and wishes, are secondary to my children’s.