100 Quotes to Use for Copywork

I like to share quotes with my kids as a way of getting them to think about the world in which we live. This list of 100 Quotes to Use for Copywork has authors, artists, philosophers, actors, Bible verses, and more! 

1. 1. Learning is not attained by chance, it must be sought for with ardor and diligence. Abigail Adams
2. If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude. Don’t complain. Maya Angelou
3. If the highest aim of a captain were to preserve his ship, he would keep it in port forever. Thomas Aquinas
4. Faith is to believe what you do not see; the reward of this faith is to see what you believe. St. Augustine
5. Pray as though everything depended on God. Work as though everything depended on you. St. Augustine
6. Courage is fear that has said its prayers. Dorothy Bernard
7. Faith is deliberate confidence in the character of God whose ways you may not understand at the time.  Oswald Chambers
8. Holiness, not happiness, is the chief end of man.  Oswald Chambers
9. Do not free the camel of the burden of his hump; you may be freeing him from being a camel. G. K. Chesterton
10. All great things are simple, and many can be expressed in single words: freedom, justice, honor, duty, mercy, hope. Winston Churchill
11. Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen. Winston Churchill
12. It does not matter how slowly you go so long as you do not stop. Confucius
13. The man who in view of gain thinks of righteousness; who in the view of danger is prepared to give up his life; and who does not forget an old agreement however far back it extends – such a man may be reckoned a complete man. Confucius
14. It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are. e e cummings
15. Just because something doesn’t do what you planned it to do doesn’t mean it’s useless. Thomas A. Edison
16. Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work. Thomas A. Edison
17. The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery every day. Never lose a holy curiosity. Albert Einstein
18. Try not to become a man of success but rather to become a man of value. Albert Einstein
19. Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go. T. S. Eliot
20. All I have seen teaches me to trust the Creator for all I have not seen. Ralph Waldo Emerson
21. Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail. Ralph Waldo Emerson
22. It’s not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters. Epictetus
23. We have two ears and one mouth so that we can listen twice as much as we speak. Epictetus
24. Time and money spent in helping men to do more for themselves is far better than mere giving. Henry Ford
25. If you would not be forgotten as soon as you are dead and rotten, either write something worth reading or do things worth the writing. Benjamin Franklin
26. Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. Benjamin Franklin
27. You must be the change you want to see in the world. Mahatma Gandhi
28. God has given us two hands – one to receive with and the other to give with. We are not cisterns made for hoarding; we are channels made for sharing. Billy Graham
29. Only God who made us can touch us and change us and save us from ourselves. Billy Graham
30. Those who stand for nothing fall for anything. Alexander Hamilton
31. There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are the messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition, and of unspeakable love. Washington Irving
32. Honesty is the first chapter of the book of wisdom. Thomas Jefferson
33. Never trouble another for what you can do for yourself. Thomas Jefferson
34. Good, better, best. Never let it rest. ‘Til your good is better and your better is best. St. Jerome
35. I long to accomplish a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty to accomplish humble tasks as though they were great and noble. The world is moved along, not only by the mighty shoves of its heroes, but also by the aggregate of the tiny pushes of each honest worker. Helen Keller
36. When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us. Helen Keller
37. If a man is called to be a streetsweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, here lived a great streetsweeper who did his job well. Martin Luther King Jr.
38. Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter. Martin Luther King Jr.
39. We have forty million reasons for failure, but not a single excuse. Rudyard Kipling
40. Never do a wrong thing to make a friend or to keep one. Robert E. Lee
41. If you have any fault to find with anyone, tell him, not others, of what you complain; there is no more dangerous experiment than that of undertaking to be one thing before a man’s face and another behind his back. Robert E. Lee
42. Don’t use words too big for the subject. Don’t say ‘infinitely’ when you mean ‘very’; otherwise you’ll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite. C. S. Lewis
43. God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing. C. S. Lewis
44. Most folks are about as happy as they make up their minds to be. Abraham Lincoln
45. You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today. Abraham Lincoln
46. Each morning sees some task begun, each evening sees it close; Something attempted, something done, has earned a night’s repose. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
47. Most people would succeed in small things if they were not troubled with great ambitions.  Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
48. Faith is a living, daring confidence in God’s grace, so sure and certain that a man could stake his life on it a thousand times. Martin Luther
49. You are not only responsible for what you say, but also for what you do not say. Martin Luther
50. A good head and good heart are always a formidable combination. But when you add to that a literate tongue or pen, then you have something very special. Nelson Mandela
51. It always seems impossible until it’s done. Nelson Mandela
    
52. The greatest single cause of atheism in the world today is Christians who acknowledge Jesus with their lips and walk out the door and deny him with their life style. That is what an unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable. Brennan Manning
53. If people knew how hard I worked to get my mastery, it wouldn’t seem so wonderful at all. Michelangelo
54. Promise me you’ll always remember: You’re braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think. A. A. Milne
55. This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being. Isaac Newton
56. God is the same God, always and everywhere. He is omnipresent not virtually only, but also substantially, for virtue cannot subsist without substance. Isaac Newton
57. Praying is no easy matter. It demands a relationship in which you allow someone other than yourself to enter into the very center of your person, to see there what you would rather leave in darkness, and to touch there what you would rather leave untouched. Henri Nouwen
58. Our business is to present the Christian faith clothed in modern terms, not to propagate modern thought clothed in Christian terms. Confusion here is fatal. J. I. Packer
59. Reputation is what men and women think of us; character is what God and angels know of us. Thomas Paine
60. A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right. Thomas Paine
61. In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who don’t. Blaise Pascal
62. The knowledge of God is very far from the love of Him. Blaise Pascal
63. Our happiness depends on the habit of mind we cultivate. So practice happy thinking every day. Cultivate the merry heart, develop the happiness habit, and life will become a continual feast. Norman Vincent Peale
64. Throw your heart over the fence and the rest will follow. Norman Vincent Peale
65. Our goals can only be reached through a vehicle of a plan, in which we must fervently believe, and upon which we must vigorously act. There is no other route to success. Pablo Picasso
66. Better a little which is well done, than a great deal imperfectly. Plato
67. To sit back hoping that someday, someway, someone will make things right is to go on feeding the crocodile, hoping he will eat you last–but eat you he will. Ronald Reagan
68. Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there. Will Rogers
69. Great minds discuss ideas; Average minds discuss events; Small minds discuss people. Eleanor Roosevelt
70. People grow through experience if they meet life honestly and courageously. This is how character is built. Eleanor Roosevelt
71. It takes a great deal of courage to stand up to your enemies, but even more to stand up to your friends. J. K. Rowling
72. Never cut a tree down in the wintertime. Never make a negative decision in the low time. Never make your most important decisions when you are in your worst moods. Wait. Be patient. The storm will pass. The spring will come. Robert H. Schuller
73. You will suddenly realize that the reason you never changed before was because you didn’t want to. Robert H. Schuller
74. Conversation should be pleasant without scurrility, witty without affectation, free without indecency, learned without conceitedness, novel without falsehood. William Shakespeare
75. He is a man of courage who does not run away, but remains at his post and fights against the enemy. Socrates
76. If all misfortunes were laid in one common heap whence everyone must take an equal portion, most people would be contented to take their own and depart. Socrates
77. Keep your fears to yourself, but share your courage with others. Robert Louis Stevenson
78. Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless. Mother Teresa
79. Standing in the middle of the road is very dangerous; you get knocked down by the traffic from both sides. Margaret Thatcher
80. Aim above morality. Be not simply good; be good for something. Henry David Thoreau
81. It’s a job that’s never started that takes the longest to finish. J. R. R. Tolkien
82. Habit is habit, and not to be flung out the window by man, but coaxed downstairs, a step at a time.  Mark Twain
83. The man who doesn’t read good books has no advantage over the man who can’t read them. Mark Twain
84. Gratitude can transform common days into thanksgivings, turn routine jobs into joy, and change ordinary opportunities into blessings. William Arthur Ward
85. Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it. William Arthur Ward
86. We should not look back unless it is to derive useful lessons from past errors, and for the purpose of profiting by dearly bought experience. George Washington
87. Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.  George Washington
88. If you concentrate on what you don’t have, you will never, ever have enough. Oprah Winfrey
89. Wisdom is oftentimes nearer when we stoop than when we soar. William Wordsworth
90. You don’t have to be great to start, but you have to start to be great. Zig Ziglar
91. I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you. Psalm 119:11
92. For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders and he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Isaiah 9:6
93. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. John 1:1-5
94. Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. John 14:6
95. And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. Romans 8:28
96. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:38-39
97. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. Ephesians 2:8-10
98. Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. Ephesians 4:29
99. Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. Philippians 4:8
100. Rejoice always,  pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances;for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

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