John Lancaster Spalding Quotes

What purifies the heart refines language.

The narrow-minded and petty sticklers for the formalities which hedge rank and office are the true vulgarians, however observant they be of etiquette.

To love the perfection with which we do our work, or the company of those with whom we work, is the secret of learning to love the work itself.

It is a common error to imagine that to be stirring and voluble in a worthy cause is to be good and to do good.

The will—the one thing it is most important to educate—we neglect.

When the mind has grasped the matter, words come like flowers at the call of spring.

The noblest are they who turning from the things the vulgar crave, seek the source of a blessed life in worlds to which the senses do not lead.

The common man is impelled and controlled by interests; the superior, by ideas.

If we learn from those only, of whose lives and opinions we altogether approve, we shall have to turn from many of the highest and profoundest minds.

Dislike of another’s opinions and beliefs neither justifies our own nor makes us more certain of them: and to transfer the repugnance to the person himself is a mark of a vulgar mind.

Insight makes argument ridiculous.

It is not worth while to consider whether a truth be useful—it is enough that it is a truth.

Unless we consent to lack the common things which men call success, we shall hardly become heroes or saints, philosophers or poets.

To clothe truth in fitting words is to feel a satisfaction like that which comes of doing good deeds.

The first requisite of a gentleman is to be true, brave and noble, and to be therefore a rebuke and scandal to venal and vulgar souls.