John Lancaster Spalding Quotations

Base thy life on principle, not on rules.

It is not difficult to grasp and express thoughts that float on the stream of current opinion: but to think and rightly utter what is permanently true and interesting, what shall appeal to the best minds a thousand years hence, as it appeals to them to-day, this is the work of genius.

The doctrine of the utter vanity of life is a doctrine of despair, and life is hope.

The important thing is how we know, not what or how much.

Thy money, thy office, thy reputation are nothing; put away these phantom clothings, and stand like an athlete stripped for the battle.

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.

We are not masters of the truth which is borne in upon us: it overpowers us.

If we are disappointed that men give little heed to what we utter is it for their sake or our own?

To cultivate the memory we should confide to it only what we understand and love: the rest is a useless burden; for simply to know by rote is not to know at all.

We have no sympathy with those who are controlled by ideas and passions which we neither understand nor feel. Thus they who live to satisfy the appetites do not believe it possible to live in and for the soul.