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It is chiefly through books that we enjoy intercourse with superior minds. In the best books, great men talk to us, give us their most precious thoughts, and pour their souls into ours.

William Ellery Channing

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William Ellery Channing
Age: 62 †
Born: 1780
Born: April 7
Died: 1842
Died: October 2
Pastor
Preacher
Theologian
Newport
Rhode Island
Reverend William Ellery Channing
Mind
Talk
Intercourse
Men
Enjoy
Superior
Give
Superiors
Best
Precious
Soul
Souls
Book
Minds
Giving
Thoughts
Chiefly
Great
Books
Pour

More quotes by William Ellery Channing

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Other blessings may be taken away, but if we have acquired a good friend by goodness, we have a blessing which improves in value when others fail.
William Ellery Channing
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Religion is faith in an infinite Creator, who delights in and enjoins that rectitude which conscience commands us to seek. This conviction gives a Divine sanction to duty.
William Ellery Channing
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Labor is discovered to be the grand conqueror, enriching and building up nations more surely than the proudest battles.
William Ellery Channing
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What a sublime doctrine it is, that goodness cherished now is eternal life already entered on!
William Ellery Channing
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It is chiefly through books that we enjoy the intercourse with superior minds.
William Ellery Channing
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The chief evil of war is more evil. War is the concentration of all human crimes. Here is its distinguishing, accursed brand. Under its standard gather violence, malignity, rage, fraud, perfidy, rapacity, and lust. If it only slew man, it would do little. It turns man into a beast of prey.
William Ellery Channing
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War is to be ranked among the most dreadful calamities which fall on a guilty world and, what deserves consideration, it tends to multiply and perpetuate itself without end. It feeds and grows on the blood which it sheds. The passions, from which it springs, gain strength and fury from indulgence.
William Ellery Channing
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Real greatness has nothing to do with a man’s sphere. It does not lie in the magnitude of his outward agency, in the extent of the effects which he produces. The greatest men may do comparatively little.
William Ellery Channing
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Whatever you may suffer, speak the truth. Be worthy of the entire confidence of your associates. Consider what is right as to what must be done. It is not necessary that you should keep your property, or even your life, but it is necessary that you should hold fast your integrity.
William Ellery Channing
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Undoubtedly a man is to labor to better his condition, but first to better himself.
William Ellery Channing
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The cry has been that when war is declared, all opposition should be hushed. A sentiment more unworthy of a free country could hardly be propagated.
William Ellery Channing
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Grandeur of character lies wholly in force of soul, that is, in the force of thought, moral principle, and love, and this may be found in the humblest condition of life
William Ellery Channing
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We honor revelation too highly to make it the antagonist of reason, or to believe that it calls us to renounce our highest powers.
William Ellery Channing
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The great hope of society is in individual character
William Ellery Channing
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The home is the chief school of human virtues.
William Ellery Channing
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Perhaps in our presence, the most heroic deed on earth is done in some silent spirit, the loftiest purpose cherished, the most generous sacrifice made, and we do not suspect it. I believe this greatness to be most common among the multitude, whose names are never heard.
William Ellery Channing
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Progress, the growth of power, is the end and boon of liberty and, without this, a people may have the name, but want the substance and spirit of freedom.
William Ellery Channing
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A clear thought, a pure affection, a resolute act of a virtuous will, have a dignity of quite another kind, and far higher than accumulations of brick and granite and plaster and stucco, however cunningly put together.
William Ellery Channing
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A man might pass for insane who should see things as they are.
William Ellery Channing
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The mind, in proportion as it is cut off from free communication with nature, with revelation, with God, with itself, loses its life, just as the body droops when debarred from the air and the cheering light from heaven.
William Ellery Channing