So the best system of education is that which draws its chief support from the voluntary effort of the community, from the individual effort of citizens, and from those burdens of taxation which they voluntarily impose upon themselves.... Government shall be only a help to them, rather than a commander, in the work of education. * * * * * I would rather be beaten in Right than succeed in Wrong. * * * * * Present evils always seem greater than those that never come. * * * * * Poverty is uncomfortable, as I can testify; but nine times out of ten the best thing that can happen to a young man is to be tossed overboard and compelled to sink or swim for himself. In all my acquaintance I never knew a man to be drowned who was worth the saving. * * * * * For the noblest man that lives there still remains a conflict. * * * * * No man can make a speech alone. It is the great human power that strikes up from a thousand minds that acts upon him and makes the speech. * * * * * After the battle of Arms comes the battle of History. * * * * * There is a fellowship among the Virtues by which one great, generous passion stimulates another. * * * * * Growth is better than Permanence, and permanent growth is better than all. * * * * * The principles of Ethics have not changed by the lapse of years. * * * * * The possession of great power no doubt carries with it a contempt for mere external show. [From a Speech on Repealing the Salary Clause, 1873.] One of the brightest and greatest of men I know in this nation [Louis Agassiz], a man who, perhaps, has done as much for its intellectual life as any other, told me not many months ago that he had made it the rule of his life to abandon any intellectual pursuit the moment it became commercially valuable; that others would utilize what he had discovered; that his field of work was above the line of commercial values, and when he brought down the great truths of science from the upper heights to the level of commercial values, a thousand hands would be ready to take them, and make them more valuable in the markets of the world. He entered upon his great career, not for the salary it gave him, for that was meagre compared with the pay of those in the lower walks of life; but he followed the promptings of his great nature, and worked for the love of truth and the instruction of mankind. [Letter to B. A. Hinsdale, 1874.] The worst days of darkness through which I have ever passed have been greatly alleviated by throwing myself with all my energy into some work relating to others. [Speech on the Currency and the Public Faith, April 8, 1874.]