David O. McKay Quotes

No other success can compensate for failure in the home. The poorest shack in which love prevails over a united family is of greater value to God and future humanity that any other riches. In such a home God can work miracles and will work miracles.

Let us realize that: the privilege to work is a gift, the power to work is a blessing, the love of work is success!

I'm going to tell you the most important secret of human life. The most critical need of the human soul is to be kind.

The home is the first and most effective place to learn the lessons of life: truth, honor, virtue, self control, the value of education, honest work, and the purpose and privilege of life. Nothing can take the place of home in rearing and teaching children, and no other success can compensate for failure in the home.

Thoughts mold your features. Thoughts lift your soul heavenward or drag you toward hell. … As nothing reveals character like the company we like and keep, so nothing foretells futurity like the thoughts over which we brood. … To have the approval of your conscience when you are alone with your thoughts is like being in the company of true and loving friends. To merit your own self-respect gives strength to character. Conscience is the link that binds your soul to the spirit of God.

The greatest work we will ever do will be within the walls of our home.

There should be no yelling in the home unless there is a fire.

Your thoughts are the architects of your destiny.

Find a purpose in life so big it will challenge every capacity to be at your best.

Being a parent is the greatest trust that has been given to human beings.

Happiness and peace will come to earth only as the light of love and human compassion enter the souls of men.

True happiness comes only by making others happy.

I think it must be apparent to every thinking mind that the noblest of all professions is that of teaching, and that upon the effectiveness of that teaching hangs the destiny of nations.

Children are more influenced by sermons you act than by sermons you preach.

President David O. McKay (1873-1970) observed that too many couples come to "marriage looking upon the marriage ceremony as the end of courtship instead of the beginning of an eternal courtship. ... Love can be starved to death as literally as the body that receives no sustenance. Love feeds upon kindness and courtesy"

Let husband and wife never speak to one another in loud tones,unless the house is on fire.

Happiness consists not of having, but of being. It is a warm glow of the heart at peace with itself.

Well,’ you may ask, ‘how may I know when I am in love?’ . . . George Q. Morris [who later became a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, gave this reply]: ‘My mother once said that if you meet a girl in whose presence you feel a desire to achieve, who inspires you to do your best, and to make the most of yourself, such a young woman is worthy of your love and is awakening love in your heart.

When a Father takes the child by the hand, he takes the Mother by the Heart.... The most important thing a father can do for his children is to love their mother.

True education does not consist merely in the acquiring of a few facts of science, history, literature, or art, but in the development of character.

Motherhood is the one thing in all the world which most truly exemplifies the God-given virtues of creating and sacrificing. Though it carries the woman close to the brink of death, motherhood also leads her into the very realm of the fountains of life and makes her co-partner with the Creator in bestowing upon eternal spirits mortal life.

The rising sun can dispel the darkness of night, but it cannot banish the blackness of malice, hatred, bigotry, and selfishness from the hearts of humanity.

The true purpose of life is the perfection of humanity through individual effort, under the guidance of God's inspiration. Real life is response to the best within us. To be alive only to appetite, pleasure, pride, money-making, and not to goodness and kindness, purity and love, poetry, music, flowers, stars, God and eternal hopes, is to deprive one's self of the real joy of living.

Seek to share joy with others, or to make somebody else happy, and you will find your own soul radiant with the joy you wished for another.

Every noble impulse, every unselfish expression of love, every surrender of self to something higher than self, every loyalty to an ideal, every fine courage of the soul – by doing good for good’s sake – that is spirituality. –

There is no success which can compensate for the failure of the family.

The aim of education is to develop resources in the child that will contribute to his well-being as long as life endures; to develop power of self-mastery that he may never be a slave to indulgence or other weaknesses, to develop [strong] manhood, beautiful womanhood that in every child and every youth may be found at least the promise of a friend, a companion, one who later may be fit for husband or wife, an exemplary father or a loving intelligent mother, one who can face life with courage, meet disaster with fortitude, and face death without fear.

Let us instill into the hearts of our children the love of freedom. Teach them that to be free is as precious as life itself. Fight every influence - Socialist, communist, whatever it may be - that would deprive an American citizen of the liberty vouchsafed by the Constitution. Liberty is truth. In truth we find liberty. You teachers, feel it in your hearts; instill it into the hearts of these precious children. May the Church of Jesus Christ ever stand true to the ideals of freedom.

No greater responsibility can rest upon a man, than to be a teacher of God's children

The Gospel of Jesus Christ can make bad men good and good men better, can alter human nature, and can change human lives.

All good things require effort. That which is worth having will cost part of your physical being, your intellectual power and your soul power. Let us ever keep in mind that life is largely what we make it.

Freedom of choice is more to be treasured than any possession earth can give.

Youth need guidance, direction, and proper restraint...Parents, too, have a responsibility in this training not to provoke children to wrath. They should be considerate not to irritate by vexatious commands or place unreasonable blame. Whenever possible they should give encouragement rather than remonstrance or reproof.

A man's reaction to his appetites and impulses when they are roused gives the measure of that man's character. In these reactions are revealed the man's power to govern or his forced servility to yield.

True happiness comes only by making others happy—the practical application of the Savior's doctrine of losing one's life to gain it. In short, the Christmas spirit is the Christ spirit, that makes our hearts glow in brotherly love and friendship and prompts us to kind deeds of service.

… The most worthy calling in life is that in which man can serve best his fellow man. … The noblest aim in life is to strive to live to make other lives better and happier.

Man's earthly existence is but a test as to whether he will concentrate his efforts, his mind, his soul upon things which contribute to the comfort and gratification of his physical instincts and passions, or whether he will make as his life's end and purpose the acquisition of spiritual qualities

True education is awakening a love for truth...opening the eyes of the soul to the great purpose and end of life.

Anger itself does more harm than the condition which aroused anger.

As long as the day lasts, let's give it all we got.

The first contributing factor to a happy home is the sublime virtue of loyalty, one of the noblest attributes of the human soul.

There are seeds of happiness in every soul. Our mental attitude and dispositions constitute the environment in which these seeds germinate. There is as much need for sunshine in our heart as for sunshine in the world. Today, as perhaps never before, mankind needs encouragement and cheer.

Only to the extent that men desire peace and brotherhood can the world be made better. No peace even though temporarily obtained, will be permanent, whether to individuals or nations, unless it is built upon the solid foundation of eternal principles.

Character is the aim of true education; and science, history, and literature are but means used to accomplish this desired end.

The development of our spiritual nature should concern us most. Spirituality is the highest acquisition of the soul, the divine in man; 'the supreme, crowning gift that makes him king of all created things.' It is the consciousness of victory over self and of communion with the infinite. It is spirituality alone which really gives one the best in life.

He who harbors hatred and bitterness injures himself far more than the one towards whom he manifests these evil propensities.

It is possible to make home a bit of heaven; indeed, I picture heaven to be a continuation of the ideal home

To be ignorant of one's own ignorance is to be in an unprogressive, uninspired state of existence.

That which a man continually thinks about determines his actions in times of opportunity and stress. I will know what you are if you tell me what you think about when you don't have to think.

Music is truly the universal language, and when it is excellently expressed how deeply it moves our souls