Tryon Edwards
Any act often repeated soon forms a habit; and habit allowed, steady gains in strength, At first it may be but as a spider's web, easily broken through, but if not resisted it soon binds us with chains of steel.Collection: Strength
To rule one's anger is well; to prevent it is better.Collection: Anger
Every parting is a form of death, as every reunion is a type of heaven.Collection: Death
Right actions in the future are the best apologies for bad actions in the past.Collection: Future
Sinful and forbidden pleasures are like poisoned bread; they may satisfy appetite for the moment, but there is death in them at the end.Collection: Death
Seek happiness for its own sake, and you will not find it; seek for duty, and happiness will follow as the shadow comes with the sunshine.
What we gave, we have; What we spent, we had; What we left, we lost.
The great end of education is to discipline rather than to furnish the mind; to train it to the use of its own powers, rather than fill it with the accumulation of others.
High aims form high characters, and great objects bring out great minds.
He that never changes his opinion never corrects mistakes and will never be wiser on the morrow than he is today.
Most controversies would soon be ended, if those engaged in them would first accurately define their terms, and then adhere to their definitions.
Between two evils, choose neither; between two goods, choose both.
Compromise is but the sacrifice of one right or good in the hope of retaining another - too often ending in the loss of both.
One of the great lessons the fall of the leaf teaches, is this: do your work well and then be ready to depart when God shall call.
Credulity is belief in slight evidence, with no evidence, or against evidence.
We should be as careful of the books we read, as of the company we keep. The dead very often have more power than the living.
To waken interest and kindle enthusiasm is the sure way to teach easily and successfully.
Age does not depend upon years, but upon temperament and health. Some men are born old, and some never grow so.
We weep over the graves of infants and the little ones taken from us by death; but an early grave may be the shortest way to heaven.
Accuracy of statement is one of the first elements of truth; inaccuracy is a near kin to falsehood.
Facts are God's arguments; we should be careful never to misunderstand or pervert them.
Some men are born old, and some men never seem so. If we keep well and cheerful, we are always young and at last die in youth even when in years would count as old.
To rejoice in another's prosperity is to give content to your lot; to mitigate another's grief is to alleviate or dispel your own.
Science has sometimes been said to be opposed to faith, and inconsistent with it. But all science, in fact, rests on a basis of faith, for it assumes the permanence and uniformity of natural laws - a thing which can never be demonstrated.
People never improve unless they look to some standard or example higher or better than themselves.
Mystery is but another name for ignorance; if we were omniscient, all would be perfectly plain!
To be good, we must do good; and by doing good we take a sure means of being good, as the use and exercise of the muscles increase their power.
Thoughts lead on to purpose, purpose leads on to actions, actions form habits, habits decide character, and character fixes our destiny.Collection: Character
Prejudices are rarely overcome by argument; not being founded in reason they cannot be destroyed by logic.Collection: Prejudice
Some of the best lessons we ever learn we learn from our mistakes and failures. — The error of the past is the wisdom and success of the future.Collection: Inspirational
If you would thoroughly know anything, teach it to others.Collection: Education
Never think that God's delays are God's denials. True prayer always receives what it asks, or something better.Collection: Prayer
True humility is not an abject, groveling, self-despising spirit; it is but a right estimate of ourselves as God sees us.Collection: Humility
The first step to improvement, whether mental, moral, or religious, is to know ourselves - our weaknesses, errors, deficiencies, and sins, that, by divine grace, we may overcome and turn from them all.Collection: Religious
Anxiety is the poison of human life; the parent of many sins and of more miseries.Collection: Parent
He that never changes his opinions, never corrects his mistakes, will never be wiser on the morrow than he is today.Collection: Change
A holy life is not an ascetic, or gloomy or solitary life, but a life regulated by divine truth and faithful in Christian duty. It is living above the world while we are still in it.Collection: Christian
Have a time and place for everything, and do everything in its time and place, and you will not only accomplish more, but have far more leisure than those who are always hurrying.Collection: Leisure
To murder character is as truly a crime as to murder the body: the tongue of the slanderer is brother to the dagger of the assassinCollection: Brother
Anxiety is the rust of life, destroying its brightness and weakening its power. A childlike and abiding trust in Providence is its best preventive and remedy.Collection: Life
Accuracy is the twin brother of honesty; inaccuracy is a near kin to falsehood.Collection: Brother
The first evil choice or act is linked to the second; and each one to the one that follows, both by the tendency of our evil nature and by the power of habit, which holds us as by a destinyCollection: Destiny
True religion extends alike to the intellect and the heart. Intellect is in vain if it lead not to emotion, and emotion is vain if not enlightened by intellect; and both are vain if not guided by truth and leading to duty.Collection: Heart
To rule one's anger is well; to prevent it is still better.Collection: Anger
Let your holidays be associated with great public events, and they may be the life of patriotism as well as a source of relaxation and personal employment.Collection: Holiday
My books are my tools, and the greater their variety and perfection the greater the help to my literary work.Collection: Book
All things are ordered by God, but His providence takes in our free agency, as well as His own sovereignty.Collection: Agency
We never do evil so thoroughly and heartily as when led to it by an honest but perverted, because mistaken, conscience.Collection: Evil
Conscience is merely our own judgment of the right or wrong of our actions, and so can never be a safe guide unless enlightened by the word of God.Collection: Safe