Self

The lesson of self-help is the first that the young adventurer should learn, and take to heart.
~ William Henry ("W.H.") Davenport Adams, The Secret of Success; or, How to Get on in the World (1879). Chapter VIII. Self-Help

We are what we choose to be. The great law of life is a commonplace: man is his own star; he makes or mars himself.
~ William Henry ("W.H.") Davenport Adams, The Secret of Success; or, How to Get on in the World (1879). Chapter VIII. Self-Help

Of all the tyrants that the world affords,
Our own affections are the fiercest lords.
~ Sir William Alexander, Earl of Stirling, Julius Caesar (1607).

Even if we wish it not we must sometimes be alone. It is our duty to see to it that we are prepared to be alone profitably and cheerfully, without weariness and without fear.
~ William Rounseville (W.R.) Alger, The Solitudes of Nature and of Man, or, The Loneliness of Human Life (1867). Part II. The Morals of Solitudes. Conclusion

Every man is his own greatest dupe.
~ William Rounseville (W.R.) Alger

Genuine self-sufficingness is an imperial trait, grounded only in truth and virtue. And it is a noble safeguard against belittling vices.
~ William Rounseville (W.R.) Alger

The Will is the outward manifestation of the I AM.
~ William Walker Atkinson, Thought Vibration, or the Law of Attraction in the Thought World (1906). Chapter III: A Talk About The Mind

We are what we think ourselves into being.
~ William Walker Atkinson, Thought-Force In Business And Everyday Life (1901). Lesson II: The Nature of the Force

The cognitive and emotional relationships between a human user and his or her online representation are very actively debated and could become the focus of increasingly rigorous research and a point of convergence for the social sciences.
~ William Sims Bainbridge, in Science Magazine 317: 472-476 (27 July 2007). The Scientific Research Potential of Virtual Worlds

I've always said that I was an activist before I became a celebrity.
~ William Baldwin

My confessions are shameless. I confess, but do not repent. The fact is, my confessions are prompted, not by ethical motives, but intellectual. The confessions are to me the interesting records of a self-investigator.
~ Wilhelm Nero Pilate (W.N.P.) Barbellion, in A Last Diary (1919). March 10, 1919 entry

In self-discipline one makes a "disciple" of oneself. One is one's own teacher, trainer, coach, and "disciplinarian." It is an odd sort of relationship, paradoxical in its own way, and many of us don't handle it very well.
~ William John Bennett, The Book of Virtues: A Treasury of Great Moral Stories (1993).

Others may try to feed our ego, but it is up to us to constrain it.
~ William John Bennett, The Book of Virtues: A Treasury of Great Moral Stories (1993).

We require a certain amount of self-delusion in order to maintain our self-esteem.
~ William J. Bernstein, The Investor's Manifesto: Preparing for Prosperity, Armageddon, and Everything in Between (2009). Chapter 4. The Enemy in the Mirror

I have to go off by myself to keep a balance. I can't always be, "Bill the actor." I must stop and gain perspective so as not to confuse my role and my person.
~ Bill Bixby, in TV Picture Life (September 1964).

The fox condemns the trap, not himself.
~ William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790-93). Proverbs of Hell

Salvation and damnation are habits of the soul, slowly acquired by the inner self, becoming inveterate in the passage of time.
~ William Hume Blake, A Fisherman's Creed (1923).

A will is to make a decision how you should take care of yourself.
~ Billy Blanks, Trinity Broadcasting Network (Interview; 22 March 2001). Praise The Lord

That you may retain your self-respect, it is better to displease the people by doing what you know is right, than to temporarily please them by doing what you know is wrong.
~ William J.H. Boetcker

The adventurer is within us, and he contests for our favor with the social man we are obliged to be.
~ William Bolitho, Twelve Against the Gods (1929). Introduction

Of all influences that cause men to choose wrong, selfishness is undoubtedly the strongest.
~ William R. Bradford, Address given at Brigham Young University (27 October 1981). Selflessness--Selfishness

Genuine beginnings begin within us, even when they are brought to our attention by external opportunities.
~ William Bridges, Transitions: Making Sense of Life's Changes (1980). Chapter 6: Making a Beginning

Independency of spirit is my motto -- I think for myself.
~ William Hill Brown, The Power of Sympathy: or, The Triumph of Nature. Founded in Truth (1789). Letter LIX

Self-interest is the most ingenious and persuasive of all the agents that deceive our consciences, while by means of it our unhappy and stubborn prejudices operate in their greatest force.
~ William Cullen Bryant, Lectures on Poetry before the New York Athenaeum (April 1825; published in 1884). Lecture II. On the Value and Uses of Poetry

I come from Des Moines. Somebody had to.
~ Bill Bryson, The Lost Continent: Travels in Small Town America (1989).

The only thing special about the atoms that make you is that they make you. That is of course the miracle of life.
~ Bill Bryson, A Short History of Nearly Everything (2003). Introduction

I am a reasonable person. I have bad faults. I am impatient with myself and I am impatient with other people. I am impatient with bright people who don't pay attention to their work and don't do as well as they should. But I am not a bad human being. I have never been a bad human being.
~ Raymond (William Stacey) Burr, in TV Guide Magazine (25 September-1 October, 1993). With Raymond Burr During His Final Battle

I am getting so far out one day I won't come back at all.
~ William S. Burroughs, in Letters to Allen Ginsberg, 1953-1957 (1978).

Feel with your own heart -- think with your own mind.
~ William McKendree ("Will") Carleton, from Farm Festivals (1881). The Festival Of Industry; Or, The County Fair, III

More and more life seemed to him an experience of the Ego, in no sense the Ego itself.
~ Willa Sibert Cather, Death Comes for the Archbishop (1927).

I urge you to consider your own oddity before you are troubled or offended by that of others.
~ William M. Chace, in Wesleyan LXII, No. 2 (Fall 1989). The Language of Action

Be true to your own highest convictions.
~ William Ellery Channing (D.D.), Address Introductory to the Franklin Lectures, Boston MA (September 1838). On Self-Culture

How the I pervades all things!
~ William Ellery Channing (D.D.), in Dr. Channing's Note-book (1887). Habit

If you will, you can rise.
~ William Ellery Channing (D.D.), Address Introductory to the Franklin Lectures, Boston MA (September 1838). On Self-Culture

So don't let money tell you who you are. Don't let power tell you who your are. Don't let enemies and -- for God's sake -- don't let your sins tell you who you are. Don't prove yourself. That's taken care of. All we have to do is express ourselves. It's difficult, but we're a lot more alive in pain than in complacency.
~ Rev. William Sloane Coffin, Jr. (sermon at Memorial Church, Stanford Univ.), Stanford Report (14 March 2001). The Rev. William Sloane Coffin: 'Who tells you who you are?'

The longest, most arduous trip in the world is often the journey from the head to the heart. Until that round trip is completed, we remain at war with ourselves. And, of course, those at war with themselves are apt to make casualties of others, including friends and loved ones.
~ Rev. William Sloane Coffin, Jr., from Credo (2003). Life in General

There is no smaller package in the world that that of a person all wrapped up in himself.
~ Rev. William Sloane Coffin, Jr., The Heart Is a Little to the Left: Essays on Public Morality (1999).

Ask yourself if there is any explanation of the mystery of your own life and death.
~ (William) Wilkie Collins, The Haunted Hotel (1878). Postscript

Vanity wants nothing but the motive power to develop into absolute wickedness.
~ (William) Wilkie Collins, Heart and Science: A Story of the Present Time (1883), Vol. II. Chapter XXXVI

Come, come, leave business to idlers, and wisdom to fools: they have need of 'em: wit be my faculty, and pleasure my occupation, and let father Time shake his glass.
~ William Congreve, The Old Bachelor (1693).

We never are but by ourselves betrayed.
~ William Congreve, The Old Bachelor (1693). Act III, scene i

If you stare into the mirror each morning, having no meaningful goals for the day, not even expecting to accomplish anything except routine things, you have a failure image.
~ William H. Cook, Success, Motivation, and the Scriptures (1974).

His mind his kingdom, and his will his law.
~ William Cowper, from Poems by William Cowper of the Inner Temple, Esq. (1782). Truth

I do not travel. I am not much of an extrovert, and I'm not much interested in extroverted objects. I do not care for the "ideas" of novelists. Novels are wonderful, of course, but I prefer newspapers.
~ Will (William Jacob) Cuppy

No man can ever be noble who thinks meanly or contemptuously of himself, and no man can ever be noble who thinks first and only of himself.
~ William H. (W.H.) Dallinger, quoted in The Quiver (1889). Science and Christianity. An interview with the Rev. W. H. Dallinger

The absolute corruption of self is community.
~ William H. Dickey, from The Education of Desire (1996). The Egoist

The knowledge of the course of one's life is as real as experience itself.
~ Wilhelm Dilthey, in Pattern & Meaning in History: Thoughts on History & Society (1961).

Would men but look more minutely into the glass of their own imperfections, we should find them less censorious.
~ William Scott Downey, Proverbs, by Rev. William Scott Downey (1851 edition). Chapter I

Would you have others to befriend you, be friendly: would you have them respect you, respect yourself.
~ William Scott Downey, Proverbs, by Rev. William Scott Downey (1851 edition).

It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others, of measuring one's soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity.
~ William Edward Burghardt (W.E.B.) Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk (1903). Of Our Spiritual Strivings

One of the nice things about acting is that it allows you to open up to the other people within you.
~ David William Duchovny, Playboy Interview: David Duchovny (December 1998).

The efficient man is the man who thinks for himself.
~ Charles William Eliot

So what I have been, I am; what I am, I shall be until that instant comes when I am not. And then I shall never have been.
~ William Faulkner, in Harper's Magazine (September 1933). Beyond

I feel like a wet seed wild in the hot blind earth.
~ William Faulkner, As I Lay Dying (1930).

You can't beat the combination of enthusiasm and common sense.
~ William Feather, As We Were Saying (1921).

I will always be an oasis.
~ Liam Gallagher, Pinkpop 2000 at Landgraaf, Netherlands (June 2000).

Most people are neither for you nor against you; they are thinking about themselves.
~ John William Gardner

To be ruled by Reason, rather than by Father, Nature, King, or God, is an antisocial resolve. The autonomous self listens only to its own voice, unaffected by the grate of force, the lure of bribes, or the temptations of love.
~ William H. Gass, from The World Within The Word (1978). The Doomed in Their Sinking

The teeth of self-pity had gnawed away her essential self.
~ Willa Gibbs, Seed of Mischief (1953).

Selfishness is the greatest curse of the human race.
~ William Ewart Gladstone, Speech, Hawarden (28 May 1890).

The diligent scholar is he that loves himself, and desires to have reason to applaud and love himself.
~ William Godwin, Thoughts on Man, His Nature, Productions and Discoveries (1831). Essay XIX. Of Self-Complacency

There isn't anyone to help you. Only me. And I'm the beast. Fancy thinking the beast was something you could hunt and kill! You knew, didn't you? I'm part of you.
~ William Golding, Lord of the Flies (1954). Chapter 8: Gift for the Darkness

What a man does defiles him, not what is done by others.
~ William Golding, Rites of Passage (1980). Next Day

You have an ego -- a consciousness of being an individual! ... But that doesn't mean that you are to worship yourself, to think constantly about yourself, and to live entirely for self.
~ Billy Graham, from The Quotable Billy Graham (1966).

The whole time my mindset was always to try and get better in spite of what was going on, and in spite of what you guys were writing about me. I was just trying to get better because I had no one to answer to but myself.
~ William Green, The Associated Press (27 November 2002). Browns Rookie Back Not Nearly As Green

What we are, such is our world.
~ William Withey Gull, in A Collection of the Published Writings of William Withey Gull, Volume 2 (1896). Memoir: IV. Notes and Aphorisms

Commune with thy own heart! -- for there
The better nobler self resides.
~ William Hall, from Via Crucis (1906). Self-Communion. VI

No other study fills and satisfies the soul like the study of itself.
~ Sir William Hamilton, 9th Baronet, in Lectures on Metaphysics and Logic (1858-60). Volume I. Metaphysics. Lecture II. Philosophy -- Its Absolute Utility, (B). Objective

Anyone must be mainly ignorant or thoughtless, who is surprised at everything he sees; or wonderfully conceited who expects everything to conform to his standard of propriety.
~ William Hazlitt, Lectures on the English Comic Writers (1819). On Wit and Humor

Conceit is the most contemptible and one of the most odious qualities in the world. It is vanity driven from all other shifts, and forced to appeal to itself for admiration.
~ William Hazlitt, Characteristics: in the Manner of Rochefoucault's Maxims (1823).

He who draws upon his own resources, easily comes to an end of his wealth.
~ William Hazlitt, from The Spirit of the Age (1825). William Godwin

Just as much as we see in others, we have in ourselves.
~ William Hazlitt, in Literary Examiner (London, September - December 1823). Common Places

[L]earn to conquer your own will, instead of striving to obtain the mastery of that of others.
~ William Hazlitt, Table-talk; Or, Original Essays, Volume II (1825 edition). On The Conduct Of Life; or, Advice to a School-Boy (1822 essay)

The seat of knowledge is in the head; of wisdom, in the heart. We are sure to judge wrong, if we do not feel right.
~ William Hazlitt, Characteristics: in the Manner of Rochefoucault's Maxims (1823).

Those people who are uncomfortable in themselves are disagreeable to others.
~ William Hazlitt, in Sketches and Essays (1839). On Disagreeable People (written in 1827)

Those who can command themselves, command others.
~ William Hazlitt, Characteristics: in the Manner of Rochefoucault's Maxims (1823).

True modesty and true pride are much the same thing. Both consist in setting a just value on ourselves -- neither more nor less.
~ William Hazlitt, Characteristics: in the Manner of Rochefoucault's Maxims (1823).

We can bear to be deprived of everything but our self-conceit.
~ William Hazlitt, Characteristics: in the Manner of Rochefoucault's Maxims (1823).

We talk little if we do not talk about ourselves.
~ William Hazlitt, Characteristics: in the Manner of Rochefoucault's Maxims (1823).

What I mean by living to one's-self is living in the world, as in it, not of it: it is as if no one know there was such a person, and you wished no one to know it: it is to be a silent spectator of the mighty scene of things, not an object of attention or curiosity in it; to take a thoughtful, anxious interest in what is passing in the world, but not to feel the slightest inclination to make or meddle with it.
~ William Hazlitt, Table-Talk; or, Original Essays (1821-1822). On Living to One's-self

Our religion keeps reminding us that we aren't just will and thoughts. We're also sand and wind and thunder. Rain. The seasons. All those things. You learn to respect everything because you are everything. If you respect yourself, you respect all things.
~ William Least Heat-Moon, Blue Highways: A Journey into America (1982).

Ultimately all idolatry is worship of the self projected and objectified: all idolization is self-idolization.
~ Will Herberg, Judaism and Modern Man (1951).

Here is my final point. About drugs, about alcohol, about pornography and smoking and everything else. What business is it of yours what I do, read, buy, see, say, think, who I f[*]ck, what I take into my body -- as long as I do not harm another human being on this planet?
~ Bill Hicks

I never hurt nobody but myself and that's nobody's business but my own.
~ Billie Holiday

Nothing is so hard as to understand that there are human beings in this world besides one's self and one's set.
~ William Dean Howells, Their Wedding Journey (1872). II. A Midsummer-day's Dream

The true end of man, or that which is prescribed by the eternal and immutable dictates of reason, and not suggested by vague and transient desires, is the highest and most harmonious development of his powers to a complete and consistent whole.
~ Wilhelm von Humboldt, The Limits of State Action (1791).

The pattern of our personality is like a Persian rug. It is built one knot at a time, each woven into the others. There's a continuity to self, a sense that who we are is based upon solid, reliable experience. We build our whole interpretation and understanding of the world based upon that experience or on the accuracy of our memories. If you disrupt those memories, remove continuity, what you have is an erosion of personhood.
~ William B. Hurlbut, in the San Diego Union Tribune (11 February 2004). Blanks for the memories: Someday you may be able to take a pill to forget painful recollections

What if you went to the nth degree to prove to yourself that you're the person you want to be? But you found that it's completely different from the person that you are, and you found yourself in a place that consistently refuted the facts as you sensed them?
~ William Hurt, The Associated Press (6 November 2002). Hurt Portrays Turncoat on CBS

If you are happy it is largely to your own credit. If you are miserable it is chiefly your own fault.
~ William Dewitt Hyde, The Art of Optimism, As Taught By Robert Browning (1900).

The duty we owe to ourselves is realization of our capacities and powers in harmony with each other, and in proportion to their worth as elements in a complete individual and social life.
~ William Dewitt Hyde, Practical Ethics (1892). Chapter XXI: Self

Well there's nothing to lose
And there's nothing to prove
I'll be dancing with myself.
~ Billy Idol, in Don't Stop (1981 album). Dancing With Myself

We live in our work and our affections and ideals; we are what we are interested in.
~ William Ralph (Dean) Inge, Truth and Falsehood in Religion; Six Lectures Delivered at Cambridge to Undergraduates in the Lent Term (1906). V. Religion in the Life of the Individual

[A] man has as many social selves as there are individuals who recognize him and carry an image of him in their mind.
~ William James, The Principles of Psychology (1890). Vol. 1. Chapter X: The Consciousness of Self

How pleasant is the day when we give up striving to be young, -- or slender!
~ William James, The Principles of Psychology (1890). Vol. 1. Chapter X: The Consciousness of Self

I have often thought that the best way to define a man's character would be to seek out the particular mental or moral attitude in which, when it came upon him, he felt himself most deeply and intensely active and alive. At such moments there is a voice inside which speaks and says: "This is the real me!"
~ William James, in The Letters of William James, Vol. 1 (1920). Letter to his wife in 1878

In the deepest heart of all of us there is a corner in which the ultimate mystery of things works sadly ...
~ William James, from The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy (1897). Is Life Worth Living? (originally published in 1895)

My thinking is first and last and always for the sake of my doing, and I can only do one thing at a time.
~ William James, The Principles of Psychology (1890). Vol. 2. Chapter XXII: Reasoning

Self-esteem = Success / Pretensions.
~ William James, The Principles of Psychology (1890). Vol. 1. Chapter X: The Consciousness of Self

The most natively interesting object to a man is his own personal self and its fortunes. We accordingly see that the moment a thing becomes connected with the fortunes of the self, it forthwith becomes an interesting thing.
~ William James, Talks to Teachers on Psychology: and to Students on Some of Life's Ideals (March 1899). X. Interest

Hope you don't think this is Billy Joel unplugged. I'm a piano player. I'm already unplugged.
~ Billy Joel, Lecture at Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, N.Y. (20 April 1996).

The higher stages of the mystical life are very ordinary. There is no ecstasy, no rapture, no flash of light, no bells, no incense. I am now my true self.
~ William Johnston, The Inner Eye of Love: Mysticism and Religion (1978).

I think we all have to fight the werewolf within us somehow.
~ Will Kemp, Interview in Horror.com (May 2003). The Van Helsing Interviews: Will Kemp

I think self-awareness is probably the most important thing towards being a champion.
~ Billie Jean King, in The Sportswoman (Nov/Dec 1973).

Stand fast on the faith in your own true self,
All effort is yours to choose it;
The world is full of the possible,
For you to gain or to lose it.
~ William James Lampton, In the Morning of Life

So much of who we are is where we have been.
~ William Langewiesche, Sahara Unveiled: A Journey Across the Desert (1996). Chapter 4. City in the Dunes

All the Disorder, and Corruption, and Malady of our Nature, lies in a certain Fixedness of our own Will, Imagination, and Desire, wherein we live to ourselves, are our own Centre and Circumference, act wholly from ourselves, according to our own Will, Imagination, and Desires. There is not the smallest Degree of Evil in us, but what arises from this Selfishness, because we are thus, All in All to ourselves.
~ William Law, The Grounds and Reasons of the Christian Regeneration (1739).

Self is the root, the tree, and the branches of all the evils of our fallen state.
~ William Law, An Humble, Earnest, And Affectionate Address to the Clergy (1761).

[W]hat could begin to deny self, if there were not something in man different from self?
~ William Law, The Spirit of Love, Part II. In Dialogues (1754).

[W]hen a right knowledge of ourselves enters our minds; it makes as great a change in our thoughts and apprehensions, as when we awake from the wandering of a dream.
~ William Law, A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life (1728). Chapter XVIII

When nobody around you seems to measure up, it's time to check your yardstick.
~ Bill Lemley

Listen to the great heart secrets
Thou, and thou alone, must hear.
~ William Haines Lytle, in Poems of William Haines Lytle (1894). Antony And Cleopatra (1858)

Teach me to believe in myself. If one does not do that, how shall one believe in others?
~ William Hurrell (W.H.) Mallock, The Individualist (1899). Chapter XXXVIII

One of the things my parents taught me, and I'll always be grateful as a gift, is to not ever let anybody else define me; that for me to define myself ... and I think that helped me a lot in assuming a leadership position.
~ Wilma Mankiller, Speech at Sweet Briar College (2 April 1993). Rebuilding the Cherokee Nation

Who you are is not what you are but is what you are that determines who you are.
~ William Ngwako Maphoto

Of all the elements of success, none is more vital than self-reliance, -- a determination to be one's own helper, and not to look to others for support.
~ William Mathews, Getting on in the World: Or, Hints on Success in Life (1872). Chapter VI. Self-Reliance

I happen to think that the greatest ideal man can set before himself is self-perfection.
~ W. Somerset Maugham, The Razor's Edge (1944).

I recognize that I am made up of several persons and that the person that at the moment has the upper hand will inevitably give place to another. But which is the real one? All of them or none?
~ W. Somerset Maugham, from A Writer's Notebook (1949).

In this life one has to limit oneself.
~ W. Somerset Maugham, The Creative Impulse (1926).

It has amazed me that the most incongruous traits should exist in the same person and for all that yield a plausible harmony.
~ W. Somerset Maugham, The Summing Up (1938).

It is not very comfortable to have the gift of being amused at one's own absurdity.
~ W. Somerset Maugham, Of Human Bondage (1915).

Most people have a furious itch to talk about themselves and are restrained only be the disinclination of others to listen. Reserve is an artificial quality that is developed in most of us as the result of innumerable rebuffs.
~ W. Somerset Maugham, The Summing Up (1938).

Self-complacency is the death of the artist.
~ W. Somerset Maugham, from A Writer's Notebook (1949).

When we argue for our limitations, we get to keep them.
~ Peter McWilliams, DO IT! Let's Get Off Our Buts (1994). Part One: Why We're Not Living Our Dreams

I own and operate a ferocious ego.
~ Bill Moyers, in The New York Times (3 January 1982).

I don't have a problem talking about my work, but I don't make a habit of talking about myself. There are people who are obsessed with information about my life, what clothes I'm wearing and what my exercise regime is. I'm not interested in that.
~ Bill Murray

I like myself better when I'm writing regularly.
~ Willie Nelson

There is only one map to the journey of life, and it lives within your heart.
~ Willie Nelson, The Tao of Willie: A Guide to the Happiness in Your Heart (2006). Free Willie!

Trying to be someone else is the hardest road there is.
~ Willie Nelson, The Tao of Willie: A Guide to the Happiness in Your Heart (2006). Hello. I'm Willie Nelson

Active, successful natures act, not according to the dictum "know thyself," but as if there hovered before them the commandment: will a self and thou shalt become a self.
~ Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, Human, All Too Human. First Sequel: Mixed Opinions and Maxims (March 1879).

Direct self-observation does not by any means suffice for self-knowledge. We need history, inasmuch as the past wells up in us in hundreds of ways. Indeed we ourselves are nothing other than what we sense at each instant of that onward flow. For even when we wish to go down to the stream of our apparently ownmost, most personal essence, Heraclitus's statement holds true: one does not step twice into the same river.
~ Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, Human, All Too Human (1878). Where one must travel

He who despises himself nevertheless esteems himself as a self-despiser.
~ Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

He who makes no secret of himself, enrages: so much reason have you for fearing nakedness.
~ Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathustra (1885).

I am no man. I am dynamite.
~ Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

It is some fundamental certainty which a noble soul has about itself, something which is not to be sought, is not to be found, and perhaps, also, is not to be lost. The noble soul has reverence for itself.
~ Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Neighbors praise unselfishness because they profit by it.
~ Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

One does not know -- cannot know -- the best that is in one.
~ Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil (1885-86).

One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.
~ Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

One's own self is well hidden from one's own self; of all mines of treasure, one's own is the last to be dug up.
~ Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Talking much about oneself can also be a means to conceal oneself.
~ Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil (1885-86).

The vanity of others runs counter to our taste only when it runs counter to our vanity.
~ Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil (1885-86).

I don't think you should talk about yourself in public, because nothing good ever happens.
~ Bill O'Reilly, Comedy Central, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart (15 March 2002).

If any person, through Temptation or Melancholy, shall destroy himself; his Estate, real and personal, shall notwithstanding descend to his Wife and Children, or Relations, as if he had died a natural Death.
~ William Penn, Charter of Privileges Granted by William Penn, esq. to the Inhabitants of Pennsylvania and Territories (28 October 1701).

No man is fit to command another, who cannot command himself.
~ William Penn, No Cross, No Crown (1668-1669).

Why not toast ourselves and praise ourselves since we have the best means of knowing all the good in ourselves?
~ William Pittenger, Toasts (1895). Toasts, Miscellaneous Toasts

Selfishness is the most patronized idolatry in the world.
~ William Morley (W.M.) Punshon, from Sermons by Rev. William Morley Punshon: To Which Is Prefixed A Plea For Class-Meetings (1860). VI. Zeal in the Cause of Christ

The punishment for vanity is flattery.
~ Wilhelm Raabe

Heed the voice of the Something Within. Trust your own soul, O student. Look within confidently, trustingly, and hopefully. ... Look within -- for there is the spark from the Divine Flame.
~ Yogi Ramacharaka (William Walker Atkinson) (written in the early 1900's), in Advanced Course in Yoga Philosophy and Ancient Fundamentals (December 2000).

I like to hear a man talk about himself because then I never hear anything but good.
~ Will Rogers

What's the matter with the world? There ain't but one thing wrong with every one of us in the world, and that's selfishness.
~ Will Rogers

Each person belongs to the environment, in his own person, as himself.
~ William Saroyan, The Time of Your Life (1939 play).

I longed for order and I longed for my own self. The order I found was the order of disorder.
~ William Saroyan, The Bicycle Rider in Beverly Hills (1952).

There could be no extreme vanity in my recognition of myself, if in fact there could be any at all.
~ William Saroyan, Here Comes There Goes You Know Who (1961).

Egotism erects its center in itself; love places it out of itself in the axis of the universal whole. Love aims at unity, egotism at solitude. Love is the citizen ruler of a flourishing republic, egotism is a despot in a devastated creation.
~ August Wilhelm Schlegel, Philosophical Letters. no. IV

[A]ll that is within him does condemn itself for being there.
~ William Shakespeare, Macbeth. Act V, scene ii

And oftentimes excusing of a fault
Doth make the fault the worse by the excuse.
~ William Shakespeare, King John. Act IV, scene ii

And since you know you cannot see yourself
So well as by reflection, I, your glass,
Will modestly discover to yourself
That of yourself which you yet know not of.
~ William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar. Act I, scene ii

[B]e to yourself
As you would to your friend.
~ William Shakespeare, King Henry VIII. Act I, scene i

Conceit in weakest bodies strongest works.
~ William Shakespeare, Hamlet. Act III, scene iv

I am more than common tall.
~ William Shakespeare, As You Like It. Act I, scene iii

I must not seem proud: happy are they that hear their detractions, and can put them to mending.
~ William Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing. Act II, scene iii

I will wear my heart upon my sleeve for daws to peck at.
~ William Shakespeare, Othello. Act I, scene i

In following him, I follow but myself.
~ William Shakespeare, Othello. Act I, scene i

[L]eave thy vain bibble-babble.
~ William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night. Act IV, scene ii

Love thyself last: cherish those hearts that hate thee;
Corruption wins not more than honesty.
~ William Shakespeare, King Henry VIII. Act III, scene ii

Men at some time are masters of their fates:
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings.
~ William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar. Act I, scene ii

Marry, sir, they praise me and make an ass of me; now my foes tell me plainly I am an ass: so that by my foes, sir I profit in the knowledge of myself, and by my friends, I am abused.
~ William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night. Act V, scene i

Narcissus so himself himself forsook,
And died to kiss his shadow in the brook.
~ William Shakespeare, Venus and Adonis (1593).

Now art thou what thou art, by art as well as by nature.
~ William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet. Act II, scene iv

Oh! that you could turn your eyes towards the napes of your necks, and make but an interior survey of your good selves.
~ William Shakespeare, Coriolanus

Our bodies are our gardens, to the which our wills are gardeners.
~ William Shakespeare, Othello, Act I, scene iii

Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie,
Which we ascribe to Heaven.
~ William Shakespeare, All's Well that Ends Well. Act I, scene i

Reputation, reputation, reputation! O! I have lost my reputation, I have lost the immortal part of myself, and what remains is bestial.
~ William Shakespeare, Othello. Act II, scene iii

Simply the thing I am shall make me live.
~ William Shakespeare All's Well that Ends Well. Act IV, scene iii

[S]uch as we are made of, such we be.
~ William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night. Act II, scene ii

[T]he best persuaded of himself, so crammed, as he thinks, with excellencies, that it is his grounds of faith that all that look on him love him.
~ William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night. Act II, scene iii

This above all, to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
~ William Shakespeare, Hamlet. Act I, scene iii

Virtue? A fig! 'tis in ourselves that we are thus or thus.
~ William Shakespeare, Othello, Act I, scene iii

Were I like thee, I'd throw away myself.
~ William Shakespeare, Timon of Athens. Act IV, scene iii

Who is it that can tell me who I am?
~ William Shakespeare, King Lear. Act I, scene iv

We were basically one and the same, although Jim was just about perfect, and, of course, I am perfect.
~ William Shatner

[I]f you continue ... to be yourself -- simple, honest, and unpretending -- you will enjoy through life the respect and love of friends.
~ William Tecumseh Sherman, Letter to General U.S. Grant (10 March 1864).

Admittedly, a good inner life is difficult to achieve, especially in these trying times. It takes reflection and contemplation and self-discipline.
~ William L. Shirer

You must call up every strength you own
And you can rip off the whole facial mask.
~ William De Witt (W.D.) Snodgrass, from After Experience: Poems and Translations (1968). After Experience Taught Me

I'll be me, but I don't like it.
~ William Stafford, from An Oregon Message (1987). First Grade.

If something occurs to me, it is all right to accept it. It has one justification: it occurs to me. No one else can guide me. I must follow my own weak, wandering, diffident impulses.
~ William Stafford, in Field magazine, Oberlin College OH (Spring 1970). A Way of Writing

The more you let yourself be distracted from where you are going, the more you are the person that you are. It's not so much like getting lost as it is like getting found.
~ William Stafford, You Must Revise Your Life (1986).

The saddest are those not right in their lives
who are acting to make things right for others:
they act only from the self --
and that self will never be right:
no luck, no help, no wisdom.
~ William Stafford, from Stories That Could Be True: New and Collected Poems (1977). The Little Ways That Encourage Good Fortune

The faculty of self-estimate is rare. We always either overdo or underdo.
~ W.T. (William Thomas) Stead, Jarrow Guardian (29 February 1884). My Father

So many voices from the outer world resound in our ears that the voice which speaks within us is drowned.
~ Wilhelm Stekel, The Beloved Ego: Foundations Of The New Study Of The Psyche (1921 translation). Chapter XIX. Aphorisms

Regardless of what you are or what you have been, you can still become what you may want to be.
~ William (W.) Clement Stone, The Success System That Never Fails (1962).

Self-suggestion makes you master of yourself.
~ William (W.) Clement Stone

[T]he trouble is that we are self-centred, and no effort of the self can remove the self from the centre of its own endeavour; the very effort will plant it there the more fixedly than ever.
~ William Temple (Archbishop of York), from Nature, Man And God: Being the Gifford Lectures Delivered in the University of Glasgow in the Academic Years 1932-1933 and 1933-1934 (1934).

You may keep your beauty and your health, unless you destroy them yourself, or discourage them to stay with you, by using them ill.
~ Sir William Temple, 1st Baronet

[E]ach man looks with his own eyes, speaks with his own voice, and prays his own prayer.
~ William Makepeace Thackeray, from The English Humourists of the Eighteenth Century: A Series of Lectures (1853). Lecture the Third

I'm no angel.
~ William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair: A Novel without a Hero (1848). Chapter II

Next to the very young, I suppose the very old are the most selfish.
~ William Makepeace Thackeray, The Virginians: A Tale of the Last Century (1857-59). Chapter LXI

It is the man who is trying to be somebody else who is under restraint. He must do much for appearance only. He is anxious, nervous, and apprehensive lest he should fail to seem. In this is the most irritating restraint. It is slavery and not freedom.
~ William Makepeace Thayer, Success: Oracle of the Age (1892). LXVIII. Be Yourself

I must, for the need of myself, live my own life, for work is for the worker, at the last. Each man must please himself, and Nature has placed her approbation on this by supplying the greatest pleasure men ever know as a reward for doing good work.
~ (Wilhelm) Richard Wagner, (1844)

We bear within us the seeds of our own disintegration. Our moral imprudence puts us always in danger of accidental or reckless self-destruction. The strength of our flesh is an ever present danger to our souls.
~ Aiden Wilson (A.W.) Tozer, The Divine Conquest (1950).

The belief that you are bad, a form of evil, distorts your vision and self-esteem. This belief will enable you to produce negative results in your world. ... You are Good. You are not evil. No one is evil.
~ William A. Warch, The New Thought Christian (1977).

Four questions I should ask myself each night: Was I easy to life with? Did I grow a bit today? Was I pleasant to work with? Did I help someone along the way?
~ William Arthur Ward

There is one thing we can do better than anyone else: we can be ourselves.
~ William Arthur Ward

To make mistakes is human; to stumble is commonplace; to be able to laugh at yourself is maturity.
~ William Arthur Ward

Hobbes might be a little closer to me in terms of personality, with Calvin being more energetic, brash, always looking for life on the edge. He lives entirely in the present, and whatever he can do to make that moment more exciting he'll just let fly ... and I'm really not like that at all.
~ Bill Watterson, Honk Magazine (Interview; 1986).

I find my life is a lot easier the lower I keep everyone's expectations.
~ Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes (13 December 1988).

I was participating in my own lynching, but the problem was I didn't know what I was being lynched for.
~ William C. Westmoreland, (1984)

Since Happiness is necessarily the Supreme Object of our Desires, and Duty the Supreme Rule of our actions, there can be no harmony in our being, except our Happiness coincide with our Duty.
~ William Whewell, The Elements of Morality, including Polity, Vol. I (1845). Book III. Chapter XXV. Happiness

Blessed are they who heal us of self-despisings. Of all services which can be done to man, I know of none more precious.
~ William Hale White (aka Mark Rutherford), The Autobiography of Mark Rutherford (1881). Chapter IX. Oxford Street

A selfish heart is an evil heart, and a world where selfishness predominates is an evil world.
~ William (W.) Meynell Whittemore, Pressing Onward; Or, Earnest Counsels For Holy Living (1875). Chapter V. On Being Kept From The Evil Of The World

Love thyself last, and thou shall grow in spirit
To see, to hear, to know, and understand.
~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox, from Custer and Other Poems (1896). Love Thyself Last

We can believe in ourselves and our own ability to work out a desired result without leaning on any mortal.
~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox, in the Weekly Examiner (September 1909). The Conquest Of Environment

They define themselves in terms of what they oppose.
~ George F. Will (on conservatives), in Newsweek magazine (30 September 1974).

I think it's very important that you make your own decision about what you are. Therefore you're responsible for your actions, so you don't blame other people.
~ Prince William, 21st birthday interview with the Press Association (PA), St James's Palace (21 June 2003).

That's right, I'm the Emperor of Easy.
~ Andy Williams

One thing I've got going for me is I'm a baseball player playing a guitar. I'm not a renowned jazz guitarist. There should be people who are just happy to see me up there playing.
~ Bernie Williams (on performing a concert to promote "The Journey Within," his debut recording), in The New York Times (13 July 2003). Releasing Album, Williams Makes His Dream Real

The denial of the self has come, as is natural, to mean in general the making of the self thoroughly uncomfortable.
~ Charles (Walter Stansby) Williams, He Came Down From Heaven (1938 essay). The Precursor and the Incarnation of the Kingdom

Expression, child of soul!
~ Helen Maria Williams, from Poems on Various Subjects. With introductory remarks on the present state of science and literature in France (1823). Sonnet to Expression

I just like to kiss and hug people! That's what I do! I'm physical!
~ Lucinda Williams, in Entertainment Weekly (6 June 2001). Cow Girl Uninterrupted

My religious background is that my mother is a Christian Dior Scientist.
~ Robin Williams

I'm really exciting. I smile a lot, I win a lot, and I'm really sexy.
~ Serena Williams, The Associated Press (27 December 2002). Serena Named AP Female Athlete of Year

I don't allow myself to feel constant disappointment anymore. I don't hate myself habitually. I try to recognize my limitations and to content myself with what I'm able to do. It's all very banal: I order my coffee and juice ... then I go straight to the typewriter and don't stop until noon.
~ Thomas Lanier ("Tennessee") Williams, Playboy magazine (Interview; April 1973).

[M]y normality has been often subject to question.
~ Thomas Lanier ("Tennessee") Williams, Camino Real (1953).

[T]he only somebody worth being is the solitary and unseen you that existed from your first breath.
~ Thomas Lanier ("Tennessee") Williams, The Glass Menagerie (1944). The Catastrophe of Success

And he answered:
Am I not I -- here?
~ William Carlos Williams, from The Tempers (1913). Transitional

My surface is myself.
Under which
to witness, youth is
buried. Roots?
Everybody has roots.
~ William Carlos Williams, Paterson (1946).

I want to be famous and rich. ... I am famous and rich.
~ Wesley Willis, The Washington Post (24 November 2000). Songs in His Head

Blacks in America want to forget about slavery -- the stigma, the shame. That's the wrong move. If you can't be who you are, who can you be? How can you know what to do? We have our history. We have our book, which is the blues. And we forget it all.
~ August Wilson, in the Guardian (14 December 2002).

Confront the dark parts of yourself, and work to banish them with illumination and forgiveness. Your willingness to wrestle with your demons will cause your angels to sing. Use the pain as fuel, as a reminder of your strength.
~ August Wilson

You look up one day and you hate the whiskey, and you hate the women, and you hate the piano. But that's all you got. You can't do nothing else. All you know how to do is play that piano. Now, who am I? Am I me? Or am I the piano player?
~ August Wilson, The Piano Lesson (1987).

I'm really sort of emerging out of a cocoon that I was living in -- you know, a shell -- and coming out on my own. ... I'm not the Gastric Bypass Girl. I'm Carnie.
~ Carnie Wilson, ABC News "20/20" (30 May 2003). A Whole New Her

It is true that we cannot live without an ego; a person without an ego is little more than an idiot. Another name for ego is personality, and in artists, saints, and philosophers, the personality is a most valuable tool. ... But the personality is a dangerous servant, for it has a perpetual hankering to become the master. Every time we are carried away by irritation or indignation, personality has mastered us.
~ Colin Henry Wilson, A Criminal History of Mankind (1984).

I do as I wish; I am powerful; I am gone but I am here.
~ Ethel Davis Wilson, Swamp Angel (1954).

What poison is to food, self-pity is to life.
~ Reverand Oliver G. Wilson

No one is more interesting to anybody than is that mysterious character we all call me, which is why self-liberation, self-actualization, self-transcendence, etc., are the most exciting games in town.
~ Robert Anton Wilson, The Illuminati Papers (1980). The Abolition of Stupidity

There is a luxury in self-dispraise;
And inward self-disparagement affords
To meditative spleen a grateful feast.
~ William Wordsworth, The Excursion (1814). Book IV: Despondency Corrected

True dignity abides with him alone
Who, in the silent hour of inward thought,
Can still suspect, and still revere himself,
In lowliness of heart.
~ William Wordsworth, from Lyrical Ballads (1798). Lines left upon a Seat in a Yew-tree

We have within ourselves
Enough to fill the present day with joy,
And overspread the future years with hope.
~ William Wordsworth, from The Recluse, Part I, Book I (published in 1888). Home at Grasmere (written c. 1800)

By the help of an image
I call to my own opposite, summon all
That I have handled least, least looked upon.
~ William Butler Yeats, from Per Amica Silentia Lunae (1918). Ego Dominus Tuus

The friends that have it I do wrong
When ever I remake a song,
Should know what issue is at stake:
It is myself that I remake.
~ William Butler Yeats, from The Collected Works in Verse and Prose of William Butler Yeats, Volume II (1908).

I'm a superhero in disguise as a ne'er-do-well cad.
~ Billy Zane, Black+White magazine, Issue # 56 (October 2001). Billy the Kid