William Lyon Phelps Quotes

I divide all readers into two classes: those who read to remember and those who read to forget.

This is the final test of a gentleman: his respect for those who can be of no possible service to him.

One of the secrets of life is to keep our intellectual curiosity acute.

I am glad my ancestors arrived on the Mayflower, but I am gladder that there are nine generations between us.

Those who decide to use leisure as a means of mental development, who love good music, good books, good pictures, good plays, good company, good conversation - what are they? They are the happiest people in the world.

Whenever it is possible, a boy should choose some occupation which he should do even if he did not need the money.

The belief that youth is the happiest time of life is founded on a fallacy.

The happiest person is the person who thinks the most interesting thoughts, and we grow happier as we grow older.

The fear of life is the favorite disease of the 20th century.

A well-ordered life is like climbing a tower;

the view halfway up is better than the view from the base, and it steadily becomes finer as the horizon expands.

God speaks to me not through the thunder and the earthquake, nor through the ocean and the stars, but through the Son of Man, and speaks in a language adapted to my imperfect sight and hearing.

The final test of a gentleman is his respect for those who can be of no possible service to him.

The happiest people are those who think the most interesting thoughts.

Those who decide to use leisure as a means of mental development, who love good music, good books, good pictures, good company, good conversation, are the happiest people in the world. And they are not only happy in themselves, they are the cause of happiness in others.

If happiness truly consisted in physical ease and freedom from care, then the happiest individual would not be either a man or a woman; it would be, I think, an American cow.