Frederic Henry Hedge

“A fact is a pivot of circumstances.”

“Every man is a quotation from all his ancestors.”

“Every man is a poet when he is in love.”

“The path of genius is not less obstructed with disappointment than that of ambition.”

“The finest language is mostly made up of simple, unimposing words.”

“In this world, a man must be either anvil or hammer.”

“The crowning fortune of a man is to be born to some pursuit which finds him employment and happiness, whether it be to make baskets, or broadswords, or canals, or statues, or songs.”

“Enthusiasm is the element of success in everything.”

“Reason is the compass of the mind, and faith is the sextant.”

“A Prophet is a man who speaks from his own heart. A sectary is a man who speaks from some other man’s.”

“There is this difference between the growth of some human beings and that of others: in the one case it is a continuous dying, in the other a continuous resurrection.”

“Inspiration is a guest that does not willingly visit the lazy.”

“The finest language is mostly made up of metaphors.”

“A question is a trap, and a philosopher is a fish who breaks the net.”

“The path of genius is not less obstructed with disappointment than that of ambition.”

“A man is a bundle of relations, a knot of roots, whose flower and fruitage is the world.”

“The revelation of thought takes men out of servitude into freedom.”

“Reason is the compass of the mind.”

“Not every one who has the gift of speech understands the value of silence.”

“Humor is the blossomed fruit of reason.”