Horace Greeley Quotes

“It is impossible to enslave, mentally or socially, a bible-reading people. The principles of the bible are the groundwork of human freedom.”

— Horace Greeley

Fame is a vapor, popularity an accident, riches take wings, only one thing endures and that is character.

— Horace Greeley

“While boasting of our noble deeds we're careful to conceal
the ugly fact that by an iniquitous money system we have
nationalized a system of oppression which, though more refined,
is not less cruel than the old system of chattel slavery.”

— Horace Greeley

“I am too sick to be out of bed, too crazy to sleep, and am surrounded by horrors.”

— Horace Greeley

“He cannot wisely consent to spend the best years of his life in getting ready to live.”

— Horace Greeley

The way we do things is to begin.

— Horace Greeley

The axe is the healthiest implement that man ever handled, and is especially so for habitual writers and other sedentary workers, whose shoulders it throws back, expanding their chests, and opening their lungs. If every youth and man, from fifteen to fifty years old, could wield an axe two hours per day, dyspepsia would vanish from the earth, and rheumatism become decidedly scarce. I am a poor chopper, yet the axe is my doctor and delight. Its used gives the mind just enough occupation to prevents its falling into revery or absorbing trains of thought, while every muscle in the body receives sufficient, yet not exhausting, exercise.

— Horace Greeley

“Mr. Lincoln is already defeated. He cannot be re-elected.”

— Horace Greeley

“I never said all Democrats were saloonkeepers; what I said was all saloonkeepers are Democrats.”

— Horace Greeley

“The darkest hour in any man's life is when he sits down to plan how to get money without earning it.”

— Horace Greeley

“Journalism will kill you, but it will keep you alive while you're at it.”

— Horace Greeley

“Common sense is very uncommon.”

— Horace Greeley

“The illusion that times that were are better than those that are, has probably pervaded all ages.”

— Horace Greeley

“Ease up, the play is over.”

— Horace Greeley

“Always rise from the table with an appetite, and you will never sit down without one.”

— Horace Greeley

Apathy is a sort of living oblivion.

— Horace Greeley

“There is no bigotry like that of 'free thought' run to seed.”

— Horace Greeley

“Go West, young man, go West. There is health in the country, and room away from our crowds of idlers and imbeciles.”

— Horace Greeley

“We are not one people. We are two peoples. We are a people for Freedom and a people for Slavery. Between the two, conflict is inevitable.”

— Horace Greeley

“Bigotry is chronic dogmatism.”

— Horace Greeley

“While the Right of Suffrage is conceded to thousands notoriously ignorant, vicious, and drunken, ... a Constitutional denial to Black men, as such, of Political Rights freely secured to White men, is monstrously unjust and irrational.”

— Horace Greeley

“A cigar has " ... a fire at one end and a fool at the other."”

— Horace Greeley

“If, on a full and final review, my life and practice shall be found unworthy of my principles, let due infamy be heaped on my memory; but let none be led thereby to distrust the principles to which I proved recreant, nor yet the ability of some to adorn them by a suitable life and conversation. To unerring time be all this committed.”

— Horace Greeley

“Ah! if the pulpit would practice what it preaches, then all would be well.”

— Horace Greeley

“The darkest day in a man's career is that wherein he fancies there is some easier way of getting a dollar than by squarely earning it.”

— Horace Greeley

“The Republic needed to be passed through chastening, purifying fires of adversity and suffering: so these came and did their work and the verdure of a new national life springs greenly, luxuriantly, from their ashes.”

— Horace Greeley

“Men who have great riches and little culture rush into business, because they are weary of themselves.”

— Horace Greeley

“Journalism kills you, but it keeps you alive as long as you're doing it.”

— Horace Greeley

“We should not care much whether those thus united (against slavery) were designated 'Whig,' 'Free Democrat' or something else; though we think some simple name like 'Republican' would more fitly designate those who had united to restore the Union to its true mission of champion and promulgator of Liberty rather than propagandist of slavery.”

— Horace Greeley

“Duty and to-day are ours; results and futurity belong to God.”

— Horace Greeley

“Great grief makes sacred those upon whom its hand is laid. Joy may elevate, ambition glorify, but sorrow alone can consecrate.”

— Horace Greeley

“Washington is not a place to live in. The rents are high, the food is bad, the dust is disgusting and the morals are deplorable. Go West, young man, go West and grow up with the country.”

— Horace Greeley

“We hope never to live in a Republic where one section is pinned to the other section by bayonets.”

— Horace Greeley

“Stupidity has no friends, and wants none.”

— Horace Greeley

Do not lounge in the cities! There is room & health in the country, away from the crowds of idlers & imbeciles. Go west, before you are fitted for no life but that of the factory.

— Horace Greeley

“The word "rest" is not in my vocabulary.”

— Horace Greeley

“Talent without tact is only half talent.”

— Horace Greeley

“Our country right or wrong is an evil motto - what if your country be in the wrong? It will only compound her injury. I wish to serve the republic with an honest and fearless criticism.”

— Horace Greeley

“The best style of writing, as well as the most forcible, is the plainest.”

— Horace Greeley

“Relaxation is a physical and moral necessity. Animals, even to the simplest and dullest, have their games, their sports, their diversions. The toil-worn artisan, stooping and straining over his daily task, which taxes eye and brain and limb, ought to have opportunity and means for an hour or two of relaxation after that task is concluded.”

— Horace Greeley

“There is no doctrine of Christianity but what has been anticipated by the Vedas.”

— Horace Greeley

“I do not regret having braved public opinion, when I knew it was wrong and was sure it would be merciless.”

— Horace Greeley

“Wisdom is never dear, provided the article be genuine.”

— Horace Greeley

“No amount of preaching, exhortation, sympathy, benevolence, will render the condition of our working women what it should be, so long as the kitchen and needle are substantially their only resources.”

— Horace Greeley

“A widow of doubtful age will marry almost any sort of a white man.”

— Horace Greeley

Money is more trouble than it is worth.

— Horace Greeley

“If you have no family or friends to aid you ... turn your face to the Great West and there build up your home and fortune.”

— Horace Greeley

You may be witty, but not satirical.

— Horace Greeley

“Answering a letter from a church asking what else they should try after having failed to raise enough money on bake sales, bazaars, suppers, etc. Why not try religion?”

— Horace Greeley

“Nine-tenths of the world is entertained by scandalous rumors, which are never dissected until they are dead and, when pricked, collapse like an empty bladder.”

— Horace Greeley