Amos Bronson Alcott
One's life should be sufficiently interesting to furnish entertainment in the record.Collection: Life
Easy come, easy go... "Achieve-everything-while-doing-nothing" schemes don't work, they are just not logicalCollection: Encouragement
The richest minds need not large libraries.Collection: Mind
Genius has oftenest been the pariah of his time, the unhoused god whom none cared for, unnamed till they whom he first promoted, enriched and honored, found it honorable to own their benefactor.Collection: Genius
When one becomes indifferent to women, to children, and young people., he may know that he is superannuated, and has withdrawn from whatsoever is sweetest and purest in human existence.Collection: Children
The books that charmed us in youth recall the delight ever afterwards; we are hardly persuaded there are any like them, any deserving our equal affections.Collection: Book
Travel makes all men countrymen, makes people noblemen and kings, every man tasting of liberty and dominion.Collection: Travel
Sleep on your writing; take a walk over it; scrutinize it of a morning; review it of an afternoon; digest it after a meal; let it sleep in your drawer a twelvemonth; never venture a whisper about it to your friend, if he be an author especially.Collection: Morning
Plans made in the nursery Can change the course of historyCollection: Childhood
A friendship formed in childhood, in youth,--by happy accident at any stage of rising manhood,--becomes the genius that rules the rest of life.Collection: Friendship
Pity the mother who assumes the name without being all this implies!Collection: Mother
Whatsoever stirs the stagnant currents, setting these flowing in wholesome directions, promotes brisk spirits and productive thinking. The less of routine, the more of life.Collection: Thinking
Nor is a day lived if the dawn is left out of it, with the prospects it opens. Who speaks charmingly of nature or of mankind, like him who comes bibulous of sunrise and the fountains of waters?Collection: Morning
One's outlook is a part of his virtue.Collection: Virtue
Friends are the leaders of the bosom, being more ourselves than we are, and we complement our affections in theirs.Collection: Friends
Traveling is no fool's errand to him who carries his eyes and itinerary along with him.Collection: Travel
A man defines his standing at the court of chastity by his views of women.Collection: Men
The finer literature, indeed, is characterized by a certain suffusion of the feminine flavor, the finer, the more ideal, thought plumed with sentiment; even science loves to spring from its feet, philosophy affect the clouds to inspire and edify.Collection: Philosophy
Good-humor, gay spirits, are the liberators, the sure cure for spleen and melancholy. Deeper than tears, these irradiate the tophets with their glad heavens. Go laugh, vent the pits, transmuting imps into angels by the alchemy of smiles. The satans flee at the sight of these redeemers.Collection: Angel
Sympathy wanting, all is wanting; its personal magnetism is the conductor of the sacred spark that lights our atoms, puts us m human communion, and gives us to company, conversation, and ourselves.Collection: Sympathy
Pleasure, that immortal essence, the beauteous bead sparkling in the cup, effervesces soon and subsides.Collection: Essence
Conversation is an abandonment to ideas, a surrender to persons.Collection: Ideas
Our favorites are few; since only what rises from the heart reaches it, being caught and carried on the tongues of men wheresoever love and letters journey.Collection: Book
Ideas in the head set hands about their several tasks.Collection: Hands
The fable runs that the gods mix our pains and pleasure in one cup, and thus mingle for us the adulterate immortality which we alone are permitted here to enjoy. Voluptuous raptures, could we prolong these at pleasure, would dissipate and dissolve us. A sip is the most that mortals are permitted from any goblet of delight.Collection: Running
The wisest and best are repulsive, if they are characterized by repulsive manners. Politeness is an easy virtue, costs little, and has great purchasing power.Collection: Cost
In the ardor of his enthusiasm, a youth set forth in quest of a man of whom he might take counsel as to his future, but after long search and many disappointments, he came near relinquishing the pursuit as hopeless, when suddenly it occurred to him that one must first be a man to find a man, and profiting by this suggestion, he set himself to the work of becoming himself the man he had been seeking so long and fruitlessly.Collection: Disappointment
A sip is the most than mortals are permitted from any goblet of delight.Collection: Delight
Genius--the free and harmonious play of all the faculties of a human being.Collection: Play
The mind is fast emancipating itself from the dominion of man and of matter. It has let loose fearful forces on the world.Collection: Men
A candid spirit is mightier than the most persistent dogmatism.Collection: Spirit
A check on itself, evil subserves the economies of good, as it were a condiment to give relish to good.Collection: Evil
Heaven trims our lamps while we sleep.Collection: Sleep
Evil is retributive: every trespass slips fetters on the will, holds the soul in durance till contrition and repentance restore it to liberty.Collection: Evil
Right is the royal ruler alone; and he who rules with least restraint comes nearest to empire.Collection: Government
Action and blood now get the game. Disdain treads on the peaceful name.Collection: Games
The traveled mind is the catholic mind educated from exclusiveness and egotism.Collection: Travel
Cities with all their advantages have something hostile to liberal learning, the seductions are so subtle and accost the senses so openly on all sides.Collection: Cities
Every sin provokes its punishment.Collection: Punishment
The best teachers don't allow their own personal views to influence their teaching.Collection: Teacher
A good style fits like a good costume.Collection: Style
Friendship is a plant that loves the sun, thrives ill under clouds.Collection: Friendship
My favorite books have a personality and complexion as distinctly drawn as if the author's portrait were framed into the paragraphs and smiled upon me as I read his illustrated pages.Collection: Book
A good book is fruitful of other books; it perpetuates its fame from age to age, and makes eras in the lives of its readers.Collection: Book
An age deficient in idealism has ever been one of immorality and superficial attainment, since without the sense of ideas, nobility of character becomes of rare attainment, if possible.Collection: Character
The more one endeavors to sound the depths of his ignorance the deeper the chasm appears.Collection: Ignorance
Hold fast, therefore, O circular philosopher, to thy centre, and drive the globe along its orbit by the momentum of thy thought.Collection: Philosophy
One must be rich in thought and character to owe nothing to books.Collection: Book
Experience converts us to ourselves when books fail us.Collection: Book