“Few people take objectives really seriously. They put average effort into too many things, rather than superior thought and effort into a few important things. People who achieve the most are selective as well as determined.”

“You can do a few things superbly well, or a lot of things averagely well.”

“Congress, the press, and the bureaucracy too often focus on how much money or effort is spent, rather than whether the money or effort actually achieves the announced goal.”

“This chapter is going to kill and maim more people than all the rest put together, because people just refuse to take things seriously.”

“The key is to work out the few things that are really important, and the few methods that will give us what we really want.”

“How best to organize the efforts of individuals to achieve desired objectives has long been one of the world's most important, difficult, and controversial problems.”

“Not every difficult and dangerous thing is suitable for training, but only that which is conducive to success in achieving the object of our effort.”

“Put your energy into things that actually grow you. Too many people freely give their energy to negative thoughts, people, and situations.”

“Call me a schoolmarm, but few things make me angrier than people not taking good care of library materials.”

“It is better to teach a few things perfectly than many things indifferently, and an overloaded curriculum is useless. The object of instruction is not to produce technicians, but good active minds.”