“You say I started out with practically nothing, but that isn't correct. We all start with all there is, it's how we use it that makes things possible.”

“I invented nothing new. I simply assembled the discoveries of other men behind whom were centuries of work. Had I worked fifty or ten or even five years before, I would have failed. So it is with every new thing. Progress happens when all the factors that make for it are ready, and then it is inevitable. To teach that a comparatively few men are responsible for the greatest forward steps of mankind is the worst sort of nonsense.”

“I cannot discover that anyone knows enough to say definitely what is and what is not possible.”

“The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing.”

“There is one rule for the industrialist and that is: Make the best quality of goods possible at the lowest cost possible, paying the highest wages possible.”

“A business that makes nothing but money is a poor business.”

“Life is a series of experiences, each of which makes us bigger, even though it is hard to realize this. For the world was built to develop character, and we must learn that the setbacks and griefs which we endure help us in our marching onward.”