A man is literally what he thinks, his character being the complete sum of all his thoughts.
Source: As a Man Thinketh (1902), Thought and Character
Author
British · 1864-1912 · 10 quotes
British · 1864–1912
10 quotes in our collection
James Allen (1864-1912) was a British philosophical writer best known for As a Man Thinketh, a short book that became a classic of self-discipline and personal responsibility. His other works include From Poverty to Power, The Path of Prosperity, Byways of Blessedness, and Above Life's Turmoil. James Allen matters because he helped popularize the idea that thought, character, circumstance, and destiny are deeply connected. His writing blends Christian ethics, New Thought, Stoic self-command, and practical moral psychology. Though later self-help traditions often simplified his message, Allen himself emphasized discipline, cause and effect, serenity, service, and inward cultivation. His quotes endure because they are direct and memorable, treating the mind as a garden and character as something grown through repeated inner choices rather than chance. His work still gives self-mastery the clarity of a moral law.
Common Themes
Collected Quotes
A man is literally what he thinks, his character being the complete sum of all his thoughts.
As the plant springs from, and could not be without, the seed, so every act of a man springs from the hidden seeds of thought, and could not have appeared without them.
Man is made or unmade by himself; in the armoury of thought he forges the weapons by which he destroys himself; he also fashions the tools with which he builds for himself heavenly mansions of joy and strength and peace.
CALMNESS of mind is one of the beautiful jewels of wisdom. It is the result of long and patient effort in self-control.
Man is a growth by law, and not a creation by artifice, and cause and effect is as absolute and undeviating in the hidden realm of thought as in the world of visible and material things.
Thought and character are one, and as character can only manifest and discover itself through environment and circumstance, the outer conditions of a person's life will always be found to be harmoniously related to his inner state.
Good thoughts bear good fruit, bad thoughts bad fruit.
A man may be cursed and rich; he may be blessed and poor.
A man only begins to be a man when he ceases to whine and revile, and commences to search for the hidden justice which regulates his life.