Thomas Edison

1847 - 1931

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

A genius is a talented person who does his homework.
Good fortune is what happens when opportunity meets with preparation.

I never perfected an invention that I did not think about in terms of the service it might give others.

I have always found, when I was worrying, that the best thing to do was put my mind upon something, work hard and forget what was troubling me.

Genius is one per cent inspiration and ninety-nine per cent perspiration.

I start where the last man left off.

I don’t care so much about making my fortune as I do for getting ahead of the other fellows.

I am more of a sponge than an inventor. I absorb ideas from every source. My principal business is giving commercial value to the brilliant but misdirected ideas of others.

Restlessness and discontent are the first necessities of progress.

Thinking is hard work.

Time is really the only capital that any human being has, and the one thing that he can’t afford to lose.

Everything comes to him who hustles while he waits.

As a cure for worrying, work is better than whiskey.

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

A good idea never was lost. Its possessor may die, but it will be reborn in the mind of another.

Of all my inventions I liked the phonograph best.

Until man duplicates a blade of grass, nature can laugh at his so-called scientific knowledge.

The thing with which I lose patience most is the clock. Its hands move too fast.

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

I have more respect for the fellow with a single idea who gets there than for the fellow with a thousand ideas who does nothing.

This fellow Ford is like a postage stamp. He sticks to one thing until he gets there.

Recommended Readings:
Edison: A Biography, 1959
A Streak Of Luck, 1979

Recommended Resources:
University of Michigan