* “Restriction of free thought and free speech is the most dangerous of all subversions. It is the one un-American act that could most easily defeat us.” – William O. Douglas

* “We love in another’s soul whatever of ourselves we can deposit in it; the greater the deposit, the greater the love.” – Irving Layton

* “Procrastination can be a healthy impulse and a useful strategy when the cost/benefit and/or risk/reward ratio is against you. But when the odds are in your favor, even slightly in your favor, then the only ‘right’ time to begin something important – to start your business, develop a good habit, or do the right thing – is before you go to bed.” – Michael Masterson

“There is no point treating a depressed person as though she were just feeling sad, saying, ‘There now, hang on, you’ll get over it.’ Sadness is more or less like a head cold – with patience, it passes. Depression is like cancer.” – Barbara Kingsolver, The Bean Trees

* On Achievement: “Enterprise and hard work will almost always win, even under communism or African dictatorships.” – Taki

* On Forgiveness: “I once met a man who had forgiven an injury. I hope someday to meet the man who has forgiven an insult.” – Dr. Samuel Johnson

* On the Passage of Time: “In the middle, it feels slow. In hindsight, it feels fast.” – James Clear

* On Business Knowledge: “There are two kinds of industry know-how: specific knowledge and wisdom. Specific knowledge changes every six months. Wisdom lasts forever. The beginning entrepreneur, if he is lucky, can make do with specific knowledge. But, unless he’s accumulating wisdom, his potential for growth over the long term is low.”  – Michael Masterson

 * On the Motivation to Write: “One must be pitiless about this matter of ‘mood.’ In a sense, the writing will create the mood…. I have forced myself to begin writing when I’ve been utterly exhausted, when I’ve felt my soul as thin as a playing card, when nothing has seemed worth enduring for another five minutes… and somehow the activity of writing changes everything.” – Joyce Carol Oates via James Clear

 * On Intellectual Input: “I notice that when all a man’s information is confined to the field in which he is working, the work is never as good as it ought to be. A man has to get a perspective, and he can get it from books or from people – preferably from both. This thing of sleeping and eating with your business can easily be overdone; it is all well enough – usually necessary – in times of trouble but as a steady diet it does not make for good business; a man ought now and then to get far enough away to have a look at himself and his affairs.” Harvey S. Firestone (written in 1926)

“Restlessness is discontent and discontent is the first necessity of progress. Show me a thoroughly satisfied man and I will show you a failure.” – Thomas Edison

“Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.” – George Orwell

“Without heroes, we’re all plain people and don’t know how far we can go.” – Bernard Malamud

From Hesiod: 

“If you add a little to a little, and then do it again, soon that little shall be much.”

“It is best to do things systematically, since we are only human, and disorder is our worst enemy.”

“Work is no disgrace; it is idleness which is a disgrace.”

“Admire a small ship, but put your freight in a large one; for the larger the load, the greater will be the profit upon profit.”

“It will not always be summer; build barns.”

“Wealth is an advantage in almost every endeavor except the search for three things: honor, dignity, and personal satisfaction.” – Michael Masterson

“Pretending to be happy is easier than actually being happy. Pretending is more profitable, but also more expensive.” – Jessica Wildfire