Part of the happiness of life consists not in fighting battles but in avoiding them. A masterly retreat is in itself a victory.

The happiness of a man in this life does not consist in the absence but in the mastery of his passions.

The essays in The Great Taos Bank Robbery were my project to win a Master of Arts degree in English when I quit being a newspaper editor and went back to college.

I received my undergraduate degree in engineering in 1939 and a Master of Science degree in mathematical physics in 1941 at Steven Institute of Technology.

I believe that government is the servant of the people and not their master.

If you think of yourselves as helpless and ineffectual it is certain that you will create a despotic government to be your master. The wise despot therefore maintains among his subjects a popular sense that they are helpless and ineffectual.

Government is not reason it is not eloquent it is force. Like fire it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.

Wisdom allows nothing to be good that will not be so forever no man to be happy but he that needs no other happiness than what he has within himself no man to be great or powerful that is not master of himself.

One good schoolmaster is of more use than a hundred priests.

He who is not a good servant will not be a good master.

No man is so foolish but he may sometimes give another good counsel and no man so wise that he may not easily err if he takes no other counsel than his own. He that is taught only by himself has a fool for a master.

For good or for ill air mastery is today the supreme expression of military power and fleets and armies however vital and important must accept a subordinate rank.

One person who has mastered life is better than a thousand persons who have mastered only the contents of books but no one can get anything out of life without God.

Alcohol doesn't console it doesn't fill up anyone's psychological gaps all it replaces is the lack of God. It doesn't comfort man. On the contrary it encourages him in his folly it transports him to the supreme regions where he is master of his own destiny.

A dog barks when his master is attacked. I would be a coward if I saw that God's truth is attacked and yet would remain silent.

Someday after mastering the winds the waves the tides and gravity we shall harness for God the energies of love and then for a second time in the history of the world man will have discovered fire.

God who is eternally complete who directs the stars who is the master of fates who elevates man from his lowliness to Himself who speaks from the cosmos to every single human soul is the most brilliant manifestation of the goal of perfection.

A weed is a plant that has mastered every survival skill except for learning how to grow in rows.

Whether things turn out for the better depends on what we do. We ought not spend our time masterminding the future but recognize our marching orders: to do the best we can for history and the planet.

We must not become the new puritans and reject our society. We must address and master the future together. It can be done if we restore the belief that we share a sense of national community that we share a common national endeavor. It can be done.

Up against the corporate government voters find themselves asked to choose between look-alike candidates from two parties vying to see who takes the marching orders from their campaign paymasters and their future employers. The money of vested interest nullifies genuine voter choice and trust.

History is a relentless master. It has no present only the past rushing into the future. To try to hold fast is to be swept aside.

I'm very silly as a person but quality silliness on-screen has more of an art to it. Harrison Ford whom I was in 'Morning Glory' with has mastered that dry funny better than anyone.

A friend may well be reckoned the masterpiece of nature.

No slavery can be abolished without a double emancipation and the master will benefit by freedom more than the freed-man.

You need to put what you learn into practice and do it over and over again until it's a habit. I always say 'Seeing is not believing. Doing is believing.' There is a lot to learn about fitness nutrition and emotions but once you do you can master them instead of them mastering you.

Our goal is to make finance the servant not the master of the real economy.

So then learn to conquer your fear. This is the only art we have to master nowadays: to look at things without fear and to fearlessly do right.

I had to confront my fears and master my every demonic thought about inferiority insecurity or the fear of being black young and gifted in this Western culture.

I have no fear that the result of our experiment will be that men may be trusted to govern themselves without a master.