William Lyon Phelps Quotes

We shall never be content until each man makes his own weather and keeps it to himself.

When you mentioned something about self improvement, the implication is that the negro is something distinct or different, and, therefore, needs to learn how to improve himself. Negro leaders resent this being said, not because they don't know that it's true, but they're thinking, they're looking at it personally. They think that the implication is directed even at them, and that they, and they duck this responsibility.

I formed the hypothesis that each of us could have achieved our objectives without the terrible loss of life. And I wanted to test that by going to Vietnam.

There is no device whatever to be invented for securing happiness without industry, economy, and virtue.

In things which we know, everyone will trust us ... and we may do as we please, and no one will like to interfere with us; and we are free, and masters of others; and these things will be really ours, for we shall turn them to our good.

I've only myself to blame for it, my impotence most of all and my weakness. If I do any good work now it will be only by chance.

I'm not sure that insecurity is a good enough excuse for that sort of behavior. We're all insecure, and I really think he's old enough to have discovered the reasons behind his insecurity, and do something about them." ...Lucy

Accept the responsibility of being yourself as you are, with all that is good and with all that is bad, with all that is beautiful and that which is not beautiful. In that acceptance a transcendence happens and one becomes free.

We need to restore the full meaning of that old word, duty. It is the other side of rights.

We cannot abdicate our conscience to an organization, nor to a government.

I have found in life that if you want a miracle you first need to do whatever it is you can do – if that’s to plant, then plant; if it is to read, then read; if it is to change, then change; if it is to study, then study; if it is to work, then work; whatever you have to do. And then you will be well on your way of doing the labor that works miracles.

A parent does not do everything for their kid. A parent that does everything for their kid produces a kid with no self-confidence.

This is our bandstand. If you don't want to play, get up off the instrument and leave.

I can't think of anything that would do more toward putting us back on the road to liberty and personal responsibility than for the average American, and for the news media, to come to the understanding that we are not a democracy, nor were we supposed to be.

This sense of the safe-deposit box as a totem of responsible security inspired me to rent a box myself shortly after the birth of our first child….

I feel ashamed that so many of us cannot imagine a better way to do things than locking children up all day in cells instead of letting them grow up knowing their families, mingling with the world, assuming real obligations, striving to be independent and self-reliant and free.

There is no one that can share your responsibility. It it is your responsibility you must carry it on and you must be responsible for your actions. At the end of the day we all are being challenged, sooner or later, by our destiny. And it's up to us to make all the difference in this life. If not you, who else?

We are responsible for what we are, and whatever we wish ourselves to be, we have the power to make ourselves.

We should not judge a man's merits by his great qualities, but by the use he makes of them.

Many think that when they have confessed a fault there is no need of correcting it.

You don't just sit in the car and let some guy drive you through life, wasting your time.

Whether our efforts are, or not, favored by life, let us be able to say, when we come near to the great goal, I have done what I could.

Every man is under the natural duty of contributing to the necessities of the society; and this is all the laws should enforce on him.

I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live up to what light I have.

When you have something to do life will not allow you to ove foward until you do it.