Thomas Carlyle

127 quotations
Heroism is the divine relation which, in all times, unites a great man to other men.
Thomas Carlyle · Heroes and Heroism
History is the distillation of rumor.
Thomas Carlyle · History and Historians
The whole past is the procession of the present.
Thomas Carlyle · History and Historians
The history of the world is but the biography of great men.
Thomas Carlyle · History and Historians
Make yourself an honest man, and then you may be sure there is one less rascal in the world.
Thomas Carlyle · Honesty
Man is emphatically a proselytizing creature.
Thomas Carlyle · Humankind
The actual well seen is ideal.
Thomas Carlyle · Ideals and Idealism
I do not believe in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance.
Thomas Carlyle · Ignorance
Imagination is a poor matter when it has to part company with understanding.
Thomas Carlyle · Imagination
Pin your faith to no ones sleeves, haven't you two eyes of your own.
Thomas Carlyle · Individuality
Nothing is more terrible than activity without insight.
Thomas Carlyle · Insights
The real use of gunpowder is to make all men tall.
Thomas Carlyle · Invention and Inventor
He that can work is born to be king of something.
Thomas Carlyle · Kings
A man lives by believing something: not by debating and arguing about many things.
Thomas Carlyle · Argument
Laughter is the cipher key wherewith we decipher the whole man
Thomas Carlyle · Laughter
No man who has once heartily and wholly laughed can be altogether irreclaimably bad.
Thomas Carlyle · Laughter
Tell a person they are brave and you help them become so.
Thomas Carlyle · Leaders and Leadership
The true university of these days is a collection of books.
Thomas Carlyle · Libraries
The tragedy of life is not so much what men suffer, but rather what they miss.
Thomas Carlyle · Life and Living
Life is a little gleam of time between two eternity s.
Thomas Carlyle · Life and Living
Isolation is the sum total of wretchedness to a man.
Thomas Carlyle · Loneliness
Love is not altogether a delirium, yet it has many points in common therewith.
Thomas Carlyle · Love
Not what I have, but what I do is my kingdom.
Thomas Carlyle · Materialism
The world is a republic of mediocrities, and always was.
Thomas Carlyle · Mediocrity
If you look deep enough you will see music; the heart of nature being everywhere music.
Thomas Carlyle · Music

Subjects Thomas Carlyle spoke about

Ability Action Advice Age and Aging Argument Beginning Behavior Belief Biography Books - Reading Certainty Cheerfulness Churches Civilization Cleverness Conflict Conservatives Controversy Courage Crafts