Cyrus Augustus Bartol

We must learn that competence is better than extravagance, that worth is better than wealth, that the golden calf we have worshipped has no more brains than that one of old which the Hebrews worshipped. So beware of money and money’s worth as the supreme passion of the mind. Beware of the craving for enormous acquisition.

Temperance to be a virtue must be free, and not forced.

Look at nature with science as a lens. The rock swarms, the clod dances; the mineral is but the vegetable stepping down, and the animal an ascending plant; the man, a beast extended; and the angel, a developed human soul.

Fine manners are like personal beauty, a letter of credit everywhere.

Even pure thought is a glimpse of God.

Character is a diamond that scratches every other stone.

As diamond cuts diamond, and one hone smoothes a second, all the parts of intellect are whetstones to each other; and genius, which is but the result of their mutual sharpening, is character, too.

Hope is the parent of faith.

Good manners and good morals are sworn friends and fast allies.