Quotes from William Ellery Channing

Do anything rather than give yourself to reverie.

Every man is a volume if you know how to read him.

Each of us is meant to have a character all our own, to be what no other can exactly be, and do what no other can exactly do.

Influence is to be measured, not by the extent of surface it covers, but by its kind.

Let every man, if possible, gather some good books under his roof.

Every mind was made for growth, for knowledge, and its nature is sinned against when it is doomed to ignorance.

To give a generous hope to a man of his own nature, is to enrich him immeasurably.

Most joyful let the Poet be it is through him that all men see.

All that a man does outwardly is but the expression and completion of his inward thought. To work effectively he must think clearly to act nobly he must think nobly.

One of the tremendous evils of the world, is the monstrous accumulation of power in a few hands.

Difficulties are meant to rouse, not discourage. The human spirit is to grow strong by conflict.

No evil is intolerable but a guilty conscience.

The office of government is not to confer happiness, but to give men opportunity to work out happiness for themselves.

God deliver us all from prejudice and unkindness, and fill us with the love of truth and virtue.

He is to be educated because he is a man, and not because he is to make shoes, nails, and pins.

Fix your eyes on perfection and you make almost everything speed towards it.

Faith is love taking the form of aspiration.

A man might pass for insane who should see things as they are.

No one should part with their individuality and become that of another.

No power in society, no hardship in your condition can depress you, keep you down, in knowledge, power, virtue, influence, but by your own consent.

The home is the chief school of human virtues.

Every human being is a volume, worthy to be studied.

There are seasons, in human affairs, of inward and outward revolution, when new depths seem to be broken up in the soul, when new wants are unfolded in multitudes, and a new and undefined good is thirsted for. These are periods when… to dare is the highest wisdom.

God is another name for human intelligence raised above all error and imperfection, and extended to all possible truth.