Quotes By Thomas A. Edison

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

Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time.

Just because something doesn't do what you planned it to do doesn't mean it's useless.

To invent, you need a good imagination and a pile of junk.

Waste is worse than loss. The time is coming when every person who lays claim to ability will keep the question of waste before him constantly. The scope of thrift is limitless.

I start where the last man left off.

There is far more opportunity than there is ability.

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

One might think that the money value of an invention constitutes its reward to the man who loves his work. But... I continue to find my greatest pleasure, and so my reward, in the work that precedes what the world calls success.

Your worth consists in what you are and not in what you have.

Hell, there are no rules here - we're trying to accomplish something.

They say President Wilson has blundered. Perhaps he has, but I notice he usually blunders forward.

Show me a thoroughly satisfied man and I will show you a failure.

Discontent is the first necessity of progress.

I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.

The chief function of the body is to carry the brain around.

There will one day spring from the brain of science a machine or force so fearful in its potentialities, so absolutely terrifying, that even man, the fighter, who will dare torture and death in order to inflict torture and death, will be appalled, and so abandon war forever.

I know this world is ruled by infinite intelligence. Everything that surrounds us- everything that exists - proves that there are infinite laws behind it. There can be no denying this fact. It is mathematical in its precision.

The best thinking has been done in solitude. The worst has been done in turmoil.

Non-violence leads to the highest ethics, which is the goal of all evolution. Until we stop harming all other living beings, we are still savages.

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

Great ideas originate in the muscles.

The reason a lot of people do not recognize opportunity is because it usually goes around wearing overalls looking like hard work.

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

Maturity is often more absurd than youth and very frequently is most unjust to youth.

Be courageous. I have seen many depressions in business. Always America has emerged from these stronger and more prosperous. Be brave as your fathers before you. Have faith! Go forward!

Results! Why, man, I have gotten a lot of results. I know several thousand things that won't work.

The value of an idea lies in the using of it.

There is no substitute for hard work.

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