William Ellery Channing Quotes

The world is to be carried forward by truth, which at first offends, which wins its way by degrees, which the many hate and would rejoice to crush.

~ William Ellery Channing

To live content with small means; to seek elegance rather than luxury, and refinement rather than fashion; to be worthy, not respectable, and wealthy, not, rich; to listen to stars and birds, babes and sages, with open heart; to study hard; to think quietly, act frankly, talk gently, await occasions, hurry never; in a word, to let the spiritual, unbidden and unconscious, grow up through the common. this is my symphony.

~ William Ellery Channing

Faith is love taking the form of aspiration.

~ William Ellery Channing

The home is the chief school of human virtues.

~ William Ellery Channing

Reading is the royal road to intellectual eminence...Truly good books are more than mines to those who can understand them. They are the breathings of the great souls of past times. Genius is not embalmed in them, but lives in them perpetually.

~ William Ellery Channing

The human spirit is to grow strong by conflict.

~ William Ellery Channing

Why is it that we are so busy with the future? It is not our province; and is there not a criminal interference with Him to whom it belongs, in our feverish, anxious attempts to dispose of it, and in filling it up with shadows of good and evil shaped by our own wild imaginations? To do God's will as fast as it is made known to us, to inquire hourly--I had almost said each moment--what He requires of us, and to leave ourselves, our friends, and every interest at His control, with a cheerful trust that the path which He marks out leads to our perfection and to Himself,--this is at once our duty and happiness; and why will we not walk in the plain, simple way?

~ William Ellery Channing

To live content with small means; to seek elegance rather than luxury, and refinement rather than fashion; to be worthy, not respectable, and wealthy, not rich; to listen to stars and birds, babes and sages, with open heart; to study hard; to think quietly, act frankly, talk gently, await occasions, hurry never; in a word, to let the spiritual, unbidden and unconscious, grow up through the common - this is my symphony.

~ William Ellery Channing

a man in earnest finds means, or if he cannot find he creates them. A vigorous purpose makes much out of little, breathes power into weak instruments, disarms difficulties, and even turns them into assistances. Every condition has means of progress, if we have spirit enough to use them.

~ William Ellery Channing

Mistakes and errors are the discipline through which we advance.

~ William Ellery Channing

Faith is love taking the form of aspiration.

~ William Ellery Channing

We must not waste life in devising means. It is better to plan less and do more.

~ William Ellery Channing

We grow by love ... others are our nutriment.

~ William Ellery Channing

An earnest purpose finds time or makes it. It seizes on spare moments and turns fragments to golden account.

~ William Ellery Channing

Most joyful let the Poet be it is through him that all men see.

~ William Ellery Channing

No man should part with his own individuality and become that of another.

~ William Ellery Channing

The great hope of society is in individual character.

~ William Ellery Channing

The mind, in proportion as it is cut off from free communication with nature, with revelation, with God, with itself, loses its life, just as the body droops when debarred from the air and the cheering light from heaven.

~ William Ellery Channing

Difficulties are meant to rouse, not discourage. The human spirit is to grow strong by conflict.

~ William Ellery Channing

How easy to be amiable in the midst of happiness and success.

~ William Ellery Channing

The office of government is not to confer happiness, but to give men the opportunity to work out happiness for themselves.

~ William Ellery Channing

God is another name for human intelligence raised above all error and imperfection, and extended to all possible truth.

~ William Ellery Channing

No power in society, no hardship in your condition can depress you, keep you down, in knowledge, power, virtue, influence, but by your own consent.

~ William Ellery Channing

It is not the quantity but the quality of knowledge which determines the mind's dignity.

~ William Ellery Channing

Nothing which has entered into our experience is ever lost.

~ William Ellery Channing

The world is governed by opinion.

~ William Ellery Channing

Life has a higher end, than to be amused.

~ William Ellery Channing

Every man is a volume if you know how to read him.

~ William Ellery Channing