Quotes from Lyman Abbott

The very essence of rationalism is that it assumes that the reason is the highest faculty in man and the lord of all the rest.

He who says, "I know no fear," is no hero. No man knows courage unless he does know fear, and has that in him which is superior to fear, and conquers it.

Every man's life is, consciously or unconsciously, a quest for the infinite and the eternal reality.

Service makes men competent.

Man puts manacles on his fellow-man; God never.

If I am to tell you how to grow old gracefully, I must tell you at the beginning of life; for no man can grow old gracefully unless he begins early.

The brotherhood of man is an integral part of Christianity no less than the Fatherhood of God; and to deny the one is no less infidel than to deny the other.

God is in all nature; thank God for the scientists, for they are thinking the thoughts of God after him, whether they know it or not.

If you and I have not seen God, we cannot bear witness to God.

I believe that God is the Great Companion, that we are not left orphans, that we may have comradeship with him.

All Christian worship is a witness of the resurrection of Him who liveth for ever and ever. Because He lives, "now abideth faith, hope, charity."

It is easy to condemn, it is better to pity.

Religion is not a conclusion of the reason.

Patience is passion tamed.

Every life is a march from innocence, through temptation, to virtue or vice.

I abhor a hoe. I am fond of flowers but not of dirt, and had rather buy them than cultivate them.

It is in vain for us to devise schemes by which competition can be put out of civilized life. Competition is the condition of life.

The highest qualities of character... must be earned.

I think of death as a glad awakening from this troubled sleep which we call life; as an emancipation from a world, which, beautiful though it may be, is still a land of captivity.

I cannot harness a horse. I am afraid of a cow.

If there is to be no satisfaction in pleasure, none in wisdom, none in ambition, none in the golden mean, what then? Ah, where then? In duty. In doing right because it is right.

It is a shame for a man to be a millionaire in possessions if he is not also a millionaire in beneficence.

The artist does not really create; he discovers.

Whether we know it or not, we are all in a quest after the Great Companion. All study, all art, all music, all literature, all government, all industry are in essence a search after the Infinite.