19th-century Educator Quotes

They call every insect a "bug," but bugs are bugs, flies are flies, ants are ants, and neither flies nor ants are bugs. Indeed, no insects are bugs - excepting just bugs!

Margaret Warner Morley

Every one's abilities may be increased or strengthened by a kind of culture.

When the masses become better informed about science, they will feel less need for help from supernatural Higher Powers. The need for religion will end when man becomes sensible enough to govern himself.

Francisco Ferrer Guardia

When I consider my ministry, I think of the world. Anything less than that would not be worthy of Christ, nor of his will for my life,

Henrietta Mears

If no other consideration had convinced me of the value of the Christian life, the Christ like work which the Church of all denominations in America has done during the last 35 years for the elevation of the black man would have made me a Christian.

Booker T. Washington

When men differ in any matter of belief, let them meet each other manfully.

Francis Wayland

Whether something 'has color' or not is as hard to define verbally as are such questions as, 'What is music?' or 'What is musical?

Take from others what you want, but never be a disciple of anyone.

Tens of thousands who could never afford to own, feed and stable a horse, had by this bright invention enjoyed the swiftness of motion which is perhaps the most fascinating feature of material life.

Frances Willard

Human government, the embodied effort of man to rule the world without God, ruled over by "the prince of this world," the devil. Its mission is to execute wrath and vengeance here on earth. Human government bears the same relation to hell as the church bears to heaven.

The habit of generalizing from one particular, that mainstay of the cheap and obvious essayist, has rooted many fictions in the public eye. Nothing, for example can blot from my memory the profound, searching, and exhaustive analysis of a great nation which I learned in my small geography when I was a child, namely, 'The French are a gay and polite people fond of dancing and light wines.

Kate Douglas Wiggin

We are to have one flag, and on it the words: Holy and Pure Republic.

There are people who are excitable by nature and allow themselves to become angry for the most trivial of reasons. Judo can help such people learn to control themselves. Through training, they quickly realize that anger is a waste of energy, that it has only negative effects on the self and others.

In the presence of such weird and wondrous beauty [the night heavens], the tenderest sentiments of the heart are aroused. A feeling of awe and reverence, of softened melancholy mingled with a thought of God, comes over us, and awakens the better nature within us.

Joel Dorman Steele

Nothing in life shall sever
The chain that is round us now.

William Johnson Cory

How oddly do life and death jostle each other in this strange world of ours! How nearly allied are smiles and tears!

I regard it as the foremost task of education to insure the survival of these qualities: an enterprising curiosity, an undefeatable spirit, tenacity in pursuit, readiness for sensible self denial, and above all, compassion.

The virtues which keep this world sweet and the faithfulness which keeps it steadfast are chiefly those of the average man. The danger of the two-talent man is that he will be content with mediocrity.

Walter Russell Bowie

The end and aim of all education is the development of character.

Francis Wayland Parker

We must remake the world. The task is nothing less than that.

Mary McLeod Bethune

The student is to collect and evaluate facts. The facts are locked up in the patient.

Abraham Flexner

We really seek intelligence not for the answers it may suggest to the problems of life, but because we believe it is life,—not for aid in making the will of God prevail, but because we believe it is the will of God. We love it, as we love virtue, for its own sake, and we believe it is only virtue's other and more precise name.

Only as a grand gesture of defeat will men creep into the arms of the state and seek refuge in its power rather than their own courage.

When we think we are most free our opinions and our behavior are being skillfully manipulated by persons operating behind the scenes.

Everett Dean Martin

Wise and purposeful letting alone is the best part of education.

Charlotte Mason