Eleanor Roosevelt

My Day (Daily Column)

• No writing has any real value which is not the expression of genuine thought and feeling.
  • December 20, 1939

• It takes courage to love, but pain through love is the purifying fire which those who love generously know. We all know people who are so much afraid of pain that they shut themselves up like clams in a shell and, giving out nothing, receive nothing and therefore shrink until life is a mere living death.
  • April 1, 1939

• Laws are only observed with the consent of the individuals concerned and a moral change still depends on the individual and not on the passage of any law.
  • July 14, 1939

• Will people ever be wise enough to refuse to follow bad leaders or to take away the freedom of other people?
  • October 16, 1939

• Sometimes I wonder if we shall ever grow up in our politics and say definite things which mean something, or whether we shall always go on using generalities to which everyone can subscribe, and which mean very little.
  • July 1, 1940

• One should always sleep in all of one's guest beds, to make sure that they are comfortable.
  • September 11, 1941

• Long ago, I made up my mind that when things were said involving only me, I would pay no attention to them, except when valid criticism was carried by which I could profit.
  • January 14, 1942

• One of the blessings of age is to learn not to part on a note of sharpness, to treasure the moments spent with those we love, and to make them whenever possible good to remember, for time is short.
  • February 5, 1943

• At all times, day by day, we have to continue fighting for freedom of religion, freedom of speech, and freedom from want —for these are things that must be gained in peace as well as in war.
  • April 15, 1943

• One of the best ways of enslaving a people is to keep them from education... The second way of enslaving a people is to suppress the sources of information, not only by burning books but by controlling all the other ways in which ideas are transmitted.
  • May 11, 1943

• Only a man's character is the real criterion of worth.
  • August 22, 1944

• I have never felt that anything really mattered by the satisfaction of knowing that you stood for the things in which you believed and had done the very best you could.
  • November 8, 1944

Attributed

• Do what you feel in your heart to be right - for you'll be criticized anyway. You'll be damned if you do, and damned if you don't.

• Friendship with oneself is all-important, because without it one cannot be friends with anyone else in the world.

• For it isn't enough to talk about peace. One must believe in it. And it isn't enough to believe in it. One must work at it.

• Happiness is not a goal, it is a by-product.

• I could not at any age be content to take my place in a corner by the fireside and simply look on.

• I think, at a child's birth, if a mother could ask a fairy godmother to endow it with the most useful gift, that gift would be curiosity.

• If life were predictable it would cease to be life, and be without flavor.

• I think that somehow, we learn who we really are and then live with that decision.

• It is not fair to ask of others what you are unwilling to do yourself.

• Life was meant to be lived, and curiosity must be kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life.

• One's philosophy is not best expressed in words; it is expressed in the choices one makes. In the long run, we shape our lives and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And, the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.

• One thing life has taught me: if you are interested, you never have to look for new interests. They come to you. When you are genuinely interested in one thing, it will always lead to something else.

• The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.

• Understanding is a two-way street.

• When life is too easy for us, we must beware or we may not be ready to meet the blows which sooner or later come to everyone, rich or poor.

• When you cease to make a contribution, you begin to die.

• You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.' You must do the thing you think you cannot do.

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