Thomas A. Edison quotes: wise famous quotes, sayings and quotations by Thomas A. Edison

Thomas A. Edison Famous Quotes & Sayings

Discover top inspirational quotes from Thomas A. Edison on Wise Famous Quotes.

The perils of overwork are slight compared with the dangers of inactivity.

My main purpose in life is to make money so I can afford to go on creating more inventions ...

Do the thing and the power will come.

What a man's mind can create, man's character can control.

Nothing that's good works by itself, you've got to make the damn thing work.

When I have fully decided that a result is worth getting I go ahead of it and make trial after trial until it comes.

Ideas without execution are hallucinations.

In creating technology for ourselves we created it for the world.

I make more mistakes than anyone else I know, and sooner or later, I patent most of them.

I find out what the world needs. Then I go ahead and try to invent it

I have been at work for some time building an apparatus to see if it is possible for personalities which have left this earth to communicate with us.

Before you reject an idea, find at least five good things about it.

I know of over 3,000 ways [that] a light bulb does not work.

It is remarkable to what lengths people will go to avoid thought.

We shall have no better conditions in the future if we are satisfied with all those which we have at present.

The value of a good idea is in using it.

His genius he was quite content in one brief sentence to define; Of inspiration one percent, of perspiration, ninety nine.

It is the best book ever written on the subject. There is nothing like it!

Vision without execution is delusion.

I have never failed, I've only shown the way I did it before doesn't work.

The body is a community made up of its innumerable cells or inhabitants.

I have not failed. I have successfully discovered 1200 ideas that don't work.

To have a great idea, have a lot of them.

There's a way to do it better - find it.

I am long on ideas, but short on time. I expect to live to be only about a hundred.

The brain can be developed just the same as the muscles
can be developed, if on will only take the pains to train
the mind to think.

Nature is truly wonderful. Only man is truly foul.

I'll try anything ... I'll even try Limburger cheese!

I did not fail two thousand times. I merely found two thousand ways not to make a lightbulb.

When down in the mouth, remember Jonah. He came out all right.

I try not to invent things that people don't need.

What is a college? An institute of learning. What is a business? An institute of learning. Life, itself, is an institute of learning.

Education isn't play
and it can't be made to look like play. It is hard, hard work. But it can be made interesting work.

I think work is the world's greatest fun.

There is much more opportunity than there are people to see it.

First be sure a thing is wanted or needed, then go ahead.

Nature made us ... nature did it all ... not the gods of the religions.

Discontent is the first necessity of progress.

There are no rules here
we're trying to accomplish something.

Fools call wise men fools. A wise man never calls any man a fool.

There is always a better way.

Friendship is the heaven of life.

Five percent of the people think;
ten percent of the people think they think;
and the other eighty-five percent would rather die than think.

The inventor tries to meet the demand of a crazy civilization.

Every failure is a lesson learned about your strategy.

Failure is the most effective technique to optimize strategic planning, implementation and processes.

There is far more opportunity than there is ability.

I was at the foot of my class.

My mind is incapable of conceiving such a thing as a soul. I may be in error, and man may have a soul; but I simply do not believe it.

We will make electricity so cheap that only the rich will burn candles.

A diamond is a piece of coal that stuck to the job

I never view mistakes as failures. They are simply opportunities to find out what doesn't work.

I didn't fail 1000 times. The light bulb was an invention with 1000 steps.

I would rather have one man with enthusiasm working with me than ten who are complacent.

So far as the religion of the day is concerned, it is a damned fake ... Religion is all bunk.

There is a better way for everything. Find it.

The three great essentials to achieve anything worthwhile are, first, hard work; second, stick-to-itiveness; third, common sense.

I am so deaf I am debarred from hearing all the time articulation and have to depend on the judgment of others.

It is astonishing what an effort it seems to be for many people to put their brains definitely and systematically to work.

I never did anything worth doing by accident, nor did any of my inventions come by accident; they came by work.

I love great music and art, but I think 'cubist' songs and paintings are hideous.

Sticking to it is the genius.

I am a vegetarian as well as a passionate anti-alcoholic, because I can thus make better use of my brain.

A failure teaches you that something can't be done-that way.

Genius is 99% perspiration and 1% inspiration.

I didn't fail ten thousand times.
I successfully eliminated, ten thousand times,
materials and combinations which wouldn't work.

There is no subsitute for hard work.

Incurably religious, that is the best way to describe the mental condition of so many people.

Success is based on imagination plus ambition and the will to work.

I have better use for my brain than to poison it with alcohol. To put alcohol in the human brain is like putting sand in the bearings of an engine.

Whatever the mind of man creates, should be controlled by man's character.

Life's most soothing things are a child's goodnight and sweet music.

Anything that won't sell, I don't want to invent. Its sale is proof of utility, and utility is success.

Two per cent. is genius, and ninety-eight per cent. is hard work.

I get my ideas from listening from within.

There cannot be overproduction of anything which men and women want. And their wants are unlimited, except by the size of their stomachs.

I will not say I failed 1000 times, I will say that I discovered there are 1000 ways that can cause failure

For faith, as well intentioned as it may be, must be built on facts, not fiction - faith in fiction is a damnable false hope.

Religion is all bunk.

There is a better way to do it - Find it!

Success is the product of the severest kind of mental and physical application,

The only time I really become discouraged is when I think of all the things I would like to do and the little time I have in which to do them.

I am proud of the fact that I never invented weapons to kill.

First, study the present construction. Second, ask for all past experiences ... study and read everything you can on the subject.

I never knew I had an inventive talent until Phrenology told me so. I was a stranger to myself until then!

Success is 90% perspiration and 10% inspiration!

The biggest failure of man is that he gives up before he realizes how close he was to success.

The man who doesn't make up his mind to cultivate the habit of thinking misses the greatest pleasure in life.

I have friends in overalls whose friendship I would not swap for the favor of the kings of the world.

Genius is 1 percent inspiration, 99 percent perspiration.

The world owes nothing to any man, but every man owes something to the world.

Most of my ideas belonged to other people who never bothered to develop them.

The successful person makes a habit of doing what the failing person doesn't like to do.

Books will soon be obsolete in the schools ... Our school system will be completely changed in the next ten years.

I start where the last man left off.

Tomorrow Is My Exam But I Don't Care Because A Single Sheet Of Paper Can't Decide My Future

Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.

Of the 200 light bulbs that didn't work, every failure told me something that I was able to incorporate into the next attempt.

The endeavor to change universal power by selfish supplication I do not believe in.

The secret of success is focus of purpose.