Top 500 Thomas Carlyle Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “No pressure, no diamonds.”

— Thomas Carlyle

2. “Our main business is not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to do what lies clearly at hand.”

— Thomas Carlyle

Featured in: Common Sense Quotes, Personal Responsibility Quotes, Work Ethic Quotes, Taking Action Quotes, Productivity Quotes

3. “Go as far as you can see; when you get there, you’ll be able to see further.”

— Thomas Carlyle

Featured in: Attitude Quotes

4. “He who has health, has hope; and he who has hope, has everything.”

— Thomas Carlyle

Featured in: Quotes About Hope, Fitness Quotes, Health Quotes

5. “Endurance is patience concentrated.”

— Thomas Carlyle

Featured in: Perseverance Quotes, Patience Quotes

6. “Permanence, perseverance, and persistence in spite of all obstacles, discouragements, and impossibilities: It is these qualities that distinguish the strong soul from the weak.”

— Thomas Carlyle

Featured in: Persistence Quotes, Quotes About Strength, Obstacles Quotes, Giving Up Quotes, Commitment Quotes

7. “A person with a clear purpose will make progress, even on the roughest road. A person with no purpose will make no progress, even on the smoothest road.”

— Thomas Carlyle

Featured in: Progress Quotes

8. “A great man shows his greatness by the way he treats little men.”

— Thomas Carlyle

Featured in: Respect To Be Respected Quotes

9. “A loving heart is the beginning of all knowledge.”

— Thomas Carlyle

Featured in: Be Kind Quotes, Knowledge Quotes, Compassion Quotes, Quotes About Heart

10. “I’ve got a great ambition to die of exhaustion rather than boredom.”

— Thomas Carlyle

11. “A sad spectacle. If they be inhabited, what a scope for misery and folly. If they be not inhabited, what a waste of space.”

— Thomas Carlyle

12. “Genius is an infinite capacity for taking pains.”

— Thomas Carlyle

13. “Nothing builds self-esteem and self-confidence like accomplishment.”

— Thomas Carlyle

14. “Every man is my superior in that I may learn from him.”

— Thomas Carlyle

15. “Rest is for the dead.”

— Thomas Carlyle

16. “A man without a goal is like a ship without a rudder.”

— Thomas Carlyle

17. “My books are friends that never fail me.”

— Thomas Carlyle

Featured in: Book Quotes, Library Quotes

18. “For every one hundred men who can stand adversity there is only one who can withstand prosperity.”

— Thomas Carlyle

19. “Once the mind has been expanded by a big idea, it will never go back to its original state.”

— Thomas Carlyle

20. “Every noble work is at first impossible.”

— Thomas Carlyle

21. “Silence is more eloquent than words.”

— Thomas Carlyle

22. “The block of granite which was an obstacle in the pathway of the weak, became a stepping-stone in the pathway of the strong.”

— Thomas Carlyle

Featured in: Courage Quotes, Strong Quotes, Obstacles Quotes, Greatness Quotes, Struggle Quotes

23. “The true university of these days is a collection of books.”

— Thomas Carlyle

Featured in: Book Quotes

24. “What we become depends on what we read after all of the professors have finished with us. The greatest university of all is a collection of books.”

— Thomas Carlyle

25. “Music is well said to be the speech of angels; in fact, nothing among the utterances allowed to man is felt to be so divine. It brings us near to the infinite.”

— Thomas Carlyle

26. “Teach a parrot the terms ‘supply and demand’ and you’ve got an economist.”

— Thomas Carlyle

27. “A fair day’s wages for a fair day’s work.”

— Thomas Carlyle

28. “The best lesson which we get from the tragedy of Karbala is that Husain and his companions were rigid believers in God. They illustrated that the numerical superiority does not count when it comes to the truth and the falsehood. The victory of Husain, despite his minority, marvels me!”

— Thomas Carlyle

29. “The genuine essence of truth never dies.”

— Thomas Carlyle

30. “The universe is but one vast Symbol of God.”

— Thomas Carlyle

31. “Nothing stops the man who desires to achieve. Every obstacle is simply a course to develop his achievement muscle. It’s a strengthening of his powers of accomplishment.”

— Thomas Carlyle

32. “Of all acts of man repentance is the most divine. The greatest of all faults is to be conscious of none.”

— Thomas Carlyle

33. “Wonder is the basis of worship.”

— Thomas Carlyle

34. “He who would write heroic poems should make his whole life a heroic poem.”

— Thomas Carlyle

35. “Show me the man you honor, and I will know what kind of man you are.”

— Thomas Carlyle

36. “No great man lives in vain. The history of the world is but the biography of great men.”

— Thomas Carlyle

37. “The first duty of man is to conquer fear; he must get rid of it, he cannot act till then.”

— Thomas Carlyle

38. “Books are a triviality. Life alone is great.”

— Thomas Carlyle

Featured in: Book Quotes

39. “Habit is the deepest law of human nature.”

— Thomas Carlyle

40. “The sincere alone can recognize sincerity.”

— Thomas Carlyle

41. “Speech is of time, silence is of eternity.”

— Thomas Carlyle

42. “Conviction is worthless unless it is converted into conduct.”

— Thomas Carlyle

43. “Be not a slave of words.”

— Thomas Carlyle

44. “Nature alone is antique, and the oldest art a mushroom.”

— Thomas Carlyle

45. “Out of Eternity the new day is born; Into Eternity at night will return.”

— Thomas Carlyle

46. “Not what I have, but what I do is my kingdom.”

— Thomas Carlyle

47. “Worship is transcendent wonder.”

— Thomas Carlyle

48. “Once turn to practice, error and truth will no longer consort together.”

— Thomas Carlyle

49. “The meaning of song goes deep. Who in logical words can explain the effect music has on us? A kind of inarticulate, unfathomable speech, which leads us to the edge of the infinite, and lets us for a moment gaze into that!”

— Thomas Carlyle

50. “Who is it that loves me and will love me forever with an affection which no chance, no misery, no crime of mine can do away? It is you, my mother.”

— Thomas Carlyle