Jane Addams

I might believe I had unusual talent if I did not know what good music was; I might enjoy half an hour's practice a day if I were busy and happy the rest of the time. You do not know what life means when all the difficulties are removed! I am simply smothered and sickened with advantages. It is like eating a sweet dessert the first thing in the morning.

America's future will be determined by the home and the school. The child becomes largely what he is taught; hence we must watch what we teach, and how we live.

Action indeed is the sole medium of expression for ethics.

I am not one of those who believe - broadly speaking - that women are better than men. We have not wrecked railroads, nor corrupted legislatures, nor done many unholy things that men have done; but then we must remember that we have not had the chance.

Nothing could be worse than the fear that one had given up too soon, and left one unexpended effort that might have saved the world.

National events determine our ideals, as much as our ideals determine national events.

If the meanest man in the republic is deprived of his rights,then every man in the republic is deprived of his rights.

The essence of immorality is the tendency to make an exception of myself.

In the unceasing ebb and flow of justice and oppression we must all dig channels as best we may, that at the propitious moment somewhat of the swelling tide may be conducted to the barren places of life.