The greatest sign of success for a teacher... is to be able to say, 'The children are now working as if I did not exist.'

The teacher must derive not only the capacity, but the desire, to observe natural phenomena. The teacher must understand and feel her position of observer: the activity must lie in the phenomenon.

The greatest development is achieved during the first years of life, and therefore it is then that the greatest care should be taken. If this is done, then the child does not become a burden; he will reveal himself as the greatest marvel of nature.

Speech is one of the marvels that characterize man, and also one of the most difficult spontaneous creations that have been accomplished by nature.

It is fortunate, I think, that nature is not bounded by human reason and by laboratory work and experimentation, for by the laws of pure reason and by microscopic investigation, it might easily have been proved, long before this, that children could not be born.

How can any one paint who cannot grade colors? How can any one write poetry who has not learnt to hear and see?

The only language men ever speak perfectly is the one they learn in babyhood, when no one can teach them anything!

Dependence is not patriotism. A man does not love his mother if he hangs about her to the point of burdening her with a weak, feckless son.

All work is noble; the only ignoble thing is to live without working. There is need to realize the value of work in all its forms whether manual or intellectual, to be called 'mate,' to have sympathetic understanding of all forms of activity.

We all know the sense of comfort of which we are conscious when a good half of the floor space in a room is unencumbered; this seems to offer us the agreeable possibility of moving about freely.

A friend is a gift you give yourself.

Marriage: A friendship recognized by the police.

Our business in life is not to succeed, but to continue to fail in good spirits.

That man is a success who has lived well, laughed often and loved much.

Don't judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant.

Every heart that has beat strongly and cheerfully has left a hopeful impulse behind it in the world, and bettered the tradition of mankind.

The web, then, or the pattern, a web at once sensuous and logical, an elegant and pregnant texture: that is style, that is the foundation of the art of literature.

It is not so much for its beauty that the forest makes a claim upon men's hearts, as for that subtle something, that quality of air that emanation from old trees, that so wonderfully changes and renews a weary spirit.

Man is a creature who lives not upon bread alone, but primarily by catchwords.

To be wholly devoted to some intellectual exercise is to have succeeded in life.

Talk is by far the most accessible of pleasures. It costs nothing in money, it is all profit, it completes our education, founds and fosters our friendships, and can be enjoyed at any age and in almost any state of health.

To forget oneself is to be happy.

It is not likely that posterity will fall in love with us, but not impossible that it may respect or sympathize; so a man would rather leave behind him the portrait of his spirit than a portrait of his face.

You can give without loving, but you can never love without giving.

I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move.

I never weary of great churches. It is my favorite kind of mountain scenery. Mankind was never so happily inspired as when it made a cathedral.

It is better to lose health like a spendthrift than to waste it like a miser.

Give us grace and strength to forbear and to persevere. Give us courage and gaiety and the quiet mind, spare to us our friends, soften to us our enemies.

Keep your eyes open to your mercies. The man who forgets to be thankful has fallen asleep in life.

We are all travelers in the wilderness of this world, and the best we can find in our travels is an honest friend.

To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive.

For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move.

Compromise is the best and cheapest lawyer.

You can forgive people who do not follow you through a philosophical disquisition; but to find your wife laughing when you had tears in your eyes, or staring when you were in a fit of laughter, would go some way towards a dissolution of the marriage.

Marriage is like life - it is a field of battle, not a bed of roses.

In marriage, a man becomes slack and selfish, and undergoes a fatty degeneration of his moral being.

Marriage is one long conversation, chequered by disputes.

Most of our pocket wisdom is conceived for the use of mediocre people, to discourage them from ambitious attempts, and generally console them in their mediocrity.

Politics is perhaps the only profession for which no preparation is thought necessary.

Absences are a good influence in love and keep it bright and delicate.

Every man has a sane spot somewhere.

Keep your fears to yourself, but share your courage with others.

Nothing like a little judicious levity.

An aim in life is the only fortune worth finding.

There is only one difference between a long life and a good dinner: that, in the dinner, the sweets come last.

Wine is bottled poetry.

Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.

Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.

I am certainly not one of those who need to be prodded. In fact, if anything, I am the prod.

Politics is not a game. It is an earnest business.