Quotes from Henry Ward Beecher

Any man can work when every stroke of his hands brings down the fruit rattling from the tree ... but to labor in season and out of season, under every discouragement... that requires a heroism which is transcendent.

Prayer covers the whole of man's life. There is no thought, feeling, yearning, or desire, however low, trifling, or vulgar we may deem it, which, if it affects our real interest or happiness, we may not lay before God and be sure of sympathy. His nature is such that our often coming does not tire him. The whole burden of the whole life of every man may be rolled on to God and not weary him, though it has wearied the man.

Prayer covers the whole of man's life. There is no thought, feeling, yearning, or desire, however low, trifling, or vulgar we may deem it, which if it affects our real interest or happiness, we may not lay before God and be sure of sympathy. His nature is such that our often coming does not tire him. The whole burden of the whole life of every man may be rolled on to God and not weary him, though it has wearied man.

Failure is a school in which the truth always grows strong.

The strength of a man consists in finding out the way in which God is going, and going in that way too.

Do not look back on happiness, or dream of it in the future. You are only sure of today; do not let yourself be cheated out of it.

We steal if we touch tomorrow. It is God's.

The difference between perseverance and obstinacy is that one often comes from a strong will, and the other from a strong won't.

Victories that are cheap are cheap. Those only are worth having which come as the result of hard fighting.

I used to think the Lord's Prayer was a short prayer; but as I live longer, and see more of life, I begin to believe there is no such thing as getting through it. If a man, in praying that prayer, were to be stopped by every word until he had thoroughly prayed it, it would take him a lifetime.

A man's character is the reality of himself; his reputation, the opinion others have formed about him; character resides in him, reputation in other people; that is the substance, this is the shadow.

We should not judge people by their peak of excellence; but by the distance they have traveled from the point where they started.

Good nature is worth more than knowledge, more than money, more than honor, to the persons who possess it.

Adversity, if for no other reason, is of benefit, since it is sure to bring a season of sober reflection. People see clearer at such times. Storms purify the atmosphere.

Some men are like pyramids, which are very broad where they touch the ground, but grow narrow as they reach the sky.

The thistle is a prince. Let any man that has an eye for beauty take a view of the whole plant, and where will he see a more expressive grace and symmetry; and where is there a more kingly flower?

Ambition is the way in which a vulgar man aspires.

If a man cannot be a Christian in the place where he is, he cannot be a Christian anywhere.

The real democratic American idea is, not that every man shall be on a level with every other man, but that every man shall have liberty to be what God made him, without hindrance.

Heaven will be inherited by every man who has heaven in his soul.

He that would look with contempt on the pursuits of the farmer, is not worthy the name of a man.

A little library, growing every year, is an honorable part of a man's history. It is a man's duty to have books.

And so, every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures.

There are joys which long to be ours. God sends ten thousand truths, which come about us like birds seeking inlet; but we are shut up to them, and so they bring us nothing, but sit and sing a while upon the roof and then fly away.