Most Americans aren't the sort of citizens the Founding Fathers expected; they are contented serfs. Far from being active critics of government, they assume that its might makes it right.

Politics is the conspiracy of the unproductive but organized against the productive but unorganized.

The most fundamental purpose of government is defense, not empire.

Freedom is coming to mean little more than the right to ask permission.

War is just one more big government program.

The larger the island of knowledge, the longer the shoreline of wonder.

True humility is intelligent self respect which keeps us from thinking too highly or too meanly of ourselves. It makes us modest by reminding us how far we have come short of what we can be.

A true lover always feels in debt to the one he loves.

Let us not bankrupt our todays by paying interest on the regrets of yesterday and by borrowing in advance the troubles of tomorrow.

The test of courage comes when we are in the minority. The test of tolerance comes when we are in the majority.

A man has no more character than he can command in a time of crisis.

Love is the outreach of self toward completion.

A service of worship is primarily a service to God. When we realize this and act upon it, we make it a service to men.

Good habits, which bring our lower passions and appetites under automatic control, leave our natures free to explore the larger experiences of life. Too many of us divide and dissipate our energies in debating actions which should be taken for granted.

The roads of life are strewn with the wreckage of run-down and half-finished loves.

Whatever the right hand findeth to do, the left hand carries a watch on its wrist to show how long it takes to do it.

When the dictators and the opportunists are gone, the cross will still stand before us and something in us will say, 'That is the real thing.'

When the congregation becomes the norm by which sermons are measured, a minister has put a mortgage on his soul.

Christmas renews our youth by stirring our wonder. The capacity for wonder has been called our most pregnant human faculty, for in it are born our art, our science, our religion.