Helen Keller's Quotes

People do not like to think. If one thinks, one must reach conclusions. Conclusions are not always pleasant.

College isn't the place to go for ideas.

To me a lush carpet of pine needles or spongy grass is more welcome than the most luxurious Persian rug.

We can do anything we want to if we stick to it long enough.

Life is an exciting business, and most exciting when it is lived for others.

What a blind person needs is not a teacher but another self.

No matter how dull, or how mean, or how wise a man is, he feels that happiness is his indisputable right.

There is no king who has not had a slave among his ancestors, and no slave who has not had a king among his.

Smell is a potent wizard that transports you across thousands of miles and all the years you have lived.

My share of the work may be limited, but the fact that it is work makes it precious.

Strike against war, for without you no battles can be fought!

Of all the senses, sight must be the most delightful.

The heresy of one age becomes the orthodoxy of the next.

I seldom think about my limitations, and they never make me sad. Perhaps there is just a touch of yearning at times; but it is vague, like a breeze among flowers.

Unless we form the habit of going to the Bible in bright moments as well as in trouble, we cannot fully respond to its consolations because we lack equilibrium between light and darkness.

It is for us to pray not for tasks equal to our powers, but for powers equal to our tasks, to go forward with a great desire forever beating at the door of our hearts as we travel toward our distant goal.

Instead of comparing our lot with that of those who are more fortunate than we are, we should compare it with the lot of the great majority of our fellow men. It then appears that we are among the privileged.

The marvelous richness of human experience would lose something of rewarding joy if there were no limitations to overcome. The hilltop hour would not be half so wonderful if there were no dark valleys to traverse.

Literature is my Utopia. Here I am not disenfranchised. No barrier of the senses shuts me out from the sweet, gracious discourses of my book friends. They talk to me without embarrassment or awkwardness.

Many people know so little about what is beyond their short range of experience. They look within themselves - and find nothing! Therefore they conclude that there is nothing outside themselves either.

It is not possible for civilization to flow backwards while there is youth in the world. Youth may be headstrong, but it will advance it allotted length.

The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched - they must be felt with the heart.

Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope and confidence.

Your success and happiness lies in you. Resolve to keep happy, and your joy and you shall form an invincible host against difficulties.

Walking with a friend in the dark is better than walking alone in the light.

Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved.

I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything, but still I can do something; and because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do something that I can do.

Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing.

The most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched, they must be felt with the heart.

What we have once enjoyed we can never lose. All that we love deeply becomes a part of us.

It is wonderful how much time good people spend fighting the devil. If they would only expend the same amount of energy loving their fellow men, the devil would die in his own tracks of ennui.

So long as the memory of certain beloved friends lives in my heart, I shall say that life is good.

Self-pity is our worst enemy and if we yield to it, we can never do anything wise in this world.

Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much.

Faith is the strength by which a shattered world shall emerge into the light.

Love is like a beautiful flower which I may not touch, but whose fragrance makes the garden a place of delight just the same.

Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood.

Death is no more than passing from one room into another. But there's a difference for me, you know. Because in that other room I shall be able to see.

Everything has its wonders, even darkness and silence, and I learn, whatever state I may be in, therein to be content.

It is a terrible thing to see and have no vision.

I long to accomplish a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty to accomplish small tasks as if they were great and noble.

Keep your face to the sunshine and you cannot see a shadow.

The only thing worse than being blind is having sight but no vision.

While they were saying among themselves it cannot be done, it was done.

Never bend your head. Always hold it high. Look the world straight in the eye.

All the world is full of suffering. It is also full of overcoming.

A candle loses nothing by lighting another candle.

Three hundred years ago a prisoner condemned to the Tower of London carved on the wall of his cell this sentiment to keep up his spirits during his long imprisonment: 'It is not adversity that kills, but the impatience with which we bear adversity.

It is so often true that whether a person carries with him an atmosphere of gloom and depression or one of confidence and courage depends on his individual outlook.