Quotes Books: Wisdom & Inspiration from Great Minds

The only way to do great work is to love what you do.

Believe you can and you're halfway there.

Success is not final, failure is not fatal: It is the courage to continue that counts.

It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop.

Your time is limited, don't waste it living someone else's life.

Don't watch the clock; do what it does. Keep going.

The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.

Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.

Everything you’ve ever wanted is on the other side of fear.

Dream big and dare to fail.

Hardships often prepare ordinary people for an extraordinary destiny.

You must be the change you wish to see in the world.

Push yourself, because no one else is going to do it for you.

Great things never come from comfort zones.

Dream it. Believe it. Build it.

Success doesn’t just come and find you, you have to go out and get it.

The harder you work for something, the greater you’ll feel when you achieve it.

Dreams don’t work unless you do.

Wake up with determination. Go to bed with satisfaction.

Do something today that your future self will thank you for.

Little progress each day adds up to big results.

The key to success is to start before you’re ready.

Motivation gets you started. Habit keeps you going.

Keep your eyes on the stars and your feet on the ground.

To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.

Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.

The unexamined life is not worth living.

Happiness depends upon ourselves.

Wise men speak because they have something to say; fools because they have to say something.

It is not length of life, but depth of life.

No man ever steps in the same river twice.

He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.

We suffer more in imagination than in reality.

The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.

What cannot be imagined cannot even be talked about.

So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.

Call me Ishmael.

In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.

I am no bird; and no net ensnares me.

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, creeps in this petty pace from day to day.

Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.

A room without books is like a body without a soul.

To read a book gives a soul a shape.

Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.

The wise man does not lay up his own treasures. The more he gives to others, the more he has for himself.

By three methods we may learn wisdom: First, by reflection, which is noblest; Second, by imitation, which is easiest; and third by experience, which is the bitterest.

True wisdom comes not from knowledge, but understanding.

Wisdom begins in wonder.

It is not enough to have a good mind; the main thing is to use it well.

The fool speaks, the wise man listens.

Knowledge is power, but wisdom is harmony.

With wisdom, we understand not only facts, but meaning.

The wisest mind has something yet to learn.

Do not speak unless you can improve upon silence.

A single conversation across the table with a wise person is worth a month's study of books.

Wisdom is not a product of schooling but of the lifelong attempt to acquire it.

Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans.

The purpose of our lives is to be happy.

Life isn’t about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.

You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.

Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all.

In the end, it’s not the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your years.

Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.

Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.

The biggest adventure you can take is to live the life of your dreams.

Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it.

Even if happiness forgets you for a while, never stop remembering it.

Life is short, and it is up to you to make it sweet.

Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies.

Where there is love, there is life.

The best thing to hold onto in life is each other.

To love and be loved is to feel the sun from both sides.

Love makes a short absence longer than eternity.

Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.

If I had a flower for every time I thought of you, I could walk through my garden forever.

Love is not about how many days, months, or years you have been together. Love is about how much you love each other every single day.

In all the world, there is no heart for me like yours. In all the world, there is no love for you like mine.

Love is when the other person's happiness is more important than your own.

To be brave is to love someone unconditionally, without expecting anything in return.

Love doesn’t make the world go round. Love is what makes the ride worthwhile.

You can never get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suit me.

A room without books is like a body without a soul.

Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind.

I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library.

A great book should leave you with many experiences, and slightly exhausted at the end. You live several lives while reading.

The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you'll go.

Books are a uniquely portable magic.

Once you learn to read, you will be forever free.

There is no friend as loyal as a book.

A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies. The man who never reads lives only one.

Fiction reveals truths that reality obscures.

If you don’t like to read, you haven’t found the right book.

The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.

You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.

The only limit to our realization of tomorrow is our doubts of today.

Do not wait to strike till the iron is hot; but make it hot by striking.

You become what you believe.

Change your thoughts and you change your world.

Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.

The mind is everything. What you think you become.

Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does.

The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.

Don’t let yesterday take up too much of today.

Your level of success will seldom exceed your level of personal development.

Success is walking from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.

Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it.

Opportunities don't happen. You create them.

Try not to become a man of success. Rather become a man of value.

Don't aim for success if you want it; just do what you love and believe in, and it will come naturally.

Success is not how high you have climbed, but how you make a positive difference to the world.

Success is not in what you have, but who you are.

There is no substitute for hard work.

The secret of success is constancy to purpose.

Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in and day out.

Success is not owned, it is rented — and the rent is due every day.

I never dreamed about success. I worked for it.