Famous William Channing Quotations

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"The home is the chief school of human virtues."
by William Ellery Channing
"True love is the parent of humility."
by William Channing
"Error is discipline through which we advance."
by William Ellery Channing
"Every human being has a work to carry on within, duties to perform abroad, influence to exert, which are peculiarly his, and which no conscience but his own can teach."
by William Ellery Channing
"Nothing which has entered into our experience is ever lost."
by William E. Channing
"Poetry reveals to us the loveliness of nature, brings back the freshness of youthful feelings, reviews the relish of simple pleasures, keeps unquenched the enthusiasm which warmed the springtime of our being, refines youthful love, strengthens our interest in human mature, by vivid delineations of its tenderest and softest feelings, and through the brightness of its prophetic visions, helps faith to lay hold on the future life."
by William E. Channing
"Difficulties are meant to rouse, not discourage."
by William Ellery Channing
"Difficulties are meant to rouse, not discourage. The human spirit is to grow strong by conflict."
by William Ellery Channing
"Every mind was made for growth, for knowledge, and its nature is sinned against when it is doomed to ignorance."
by William Ellery Channing
"Great minds are to make others great. Their superiority is to be used, not to break the multitude to intellectual vassalage, not to establish over them a spiritual tyranny, but to rouse them from lethargy, and to aidthem to judge for themselves."
by William Ellery Channing
"It is chiefly through books that we enjoy intercourse with superior minds, and these invaluable means of communication are in the reach of all. In the best books, great men talk to us, give us their most precious thoughts, and pour their souls into ours."
by William E. Channing
"It is far more important to me to preserve an unblemished conscience than to compass any object however great."
by William E. Channing
"Most joyful the Poet be;
It is through him that all men see."
by William E. Channing
"To be prosperous is not to be superior, and should form no barrier between men. Wealth out not to secure the prosperous the slightest consideration. The only distinctions which should be recognized are those of the soul, of strong principle, of incorruptible integrity, of usefulness, of cultivated intellect, of fidelity in seeking the truth."
by William Ellery Channing
"To live content with small means, to seek elegance rather than luxury, and refinement rather than fashion, to be worthy, not respectable, and wealthy, not rich, to study hard, think quietly, talk gently, act frankly, to listen to stars and birds, to babes and sages, with open heart, to bear all cheerfully, do all bravely, await occasions, hurry never, in a word to let the spiritual, unbidden and unconscious, grow up through the common, this is to be my symphony."
by William Henry Channing
"He is to be educated not because he's to make shoes, nails, and pins, but because he is a man."
by William Ellery Channing
"To give a generous hope to a man of his own nature, is to enrich him immeasurably."
by William Ellery Channing
"No one should part with their individuality and become that of another."
by William Ellery Channing
"No man receives the full culture of a man in whom the sensibility to the beautiful is not cherished; and there is no condition of life from which it should be excluded. Of all luxuries this is the cheapest, and the most at hand, and most important to those conditions where coarse labor tends to give grossness to the mind."
by William Ellery Channing
"Innocent amusements are such as excite moderately, and such as produce a cheerful frame of mind, not boisterous mirth; such as refresh, instead of exhausting, the system; such as recur frequently, rather than continue long; such as send us back to our daily duties invigorated in body and spirit; such as we can partake of in the presence and society of respectable friends; such as consist with and are favorable to a grateful piety; such as are chastened by self-respect, and are accompanied with the consciousness that life has a higher end than to be amused."
by William Ellery Channing
"God be thanked for books; they are the voices of the distant and the dead, and make us heirs of the spiritual life of past ages."
by William Ellery Channing
"Every man is a volume if you know how to read him."
by William Ellery Channing
"It is chiefly through books that we enjoy the communion with superior minds. In the best books, authors talk to us, give us their most precious thoughts, and pour their souls into ours. God be thanked for books."
by William Ellery Channing
"Worship God by reverencing the human soul as God's chosen sanctuary. Revere it in yourselves, revere it in others, and labor to carry it forward. ...Go forth to respect the rights, and seek the true, enduring welfare of all within your influence. Carry with you the conviction that to trample on a human being, of whatevercolor, clime, rank, condition, is to trample on God's child. ...Go forth to do good with every power which God bestows, to make every place you enter happier by your presence, to espouse all human interests, to throw your whole weight into the scale of human freedom and improvement, to withstand all wrong, to uphold all right, and especially to give light, life, strength to the immortal soul."
by William Ellery Channing
"We smile at the ignorance of the savage who cuts down the tree in order to reach its fruit; but the same blunder is made by every person who is over eager and impatient in the pursuit of pleasure."
by William Ellery Channing
"One good anecdote is worth a volume of biography."
by William Ellery Channing
"To live content with small means; to seek elegance rather than luxury, and refinement rather than fashion; to be worthy, not respectable, and wealthy, not rich; to study hard, think quietly, talk gently, act frankly; to listen to stars and birds, to babes and sages, with open heart; to bear all cheerfully, do all bravely, await occasions, hurry never. In a word, to let the spiritual, unbidden and unconscious, grow up through the common. This is to be my symphony."
by William Henry Channing
"The world is governed by opinion."
by William Ellery Channing


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