He was born in fury and he lived in lightning. Tom came headlong into life. He was a giant in joy and enthusiasms. He didn't discover the world and its people, he created them. When he read his father's books, he was the first. He lived in a world shining and fresh and as uninspected as Eden on the sixth day. His mind plunged like a colt in a happy pasture, and when later the world put up fences, he plunged against the wire, and when the final stockade surrounded him, he plunged right through it and out. And as he was capable of giant joy, so did he harbor huge sorrow.

In every man and woman’s life there comes a time of ultimate challenge — a time when every resource we have is tested.

At the end of the day we can endure much more than we think we can.

The challenges you face will test and strengthen you. If you’re not failing, you’re not pushing your limits, and if you’re not pushing your limits, you’re not maximizing your potential.

It is impossible, but that's what makes it a worthy challenge.

He had to do them, to show he was the best.

It takes courage to push yourself to places you have never been before... to test yout limits... to break through barriers. And the day came when the risk it took to stay tight inside the bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossum.

Actually, the situation was intolerable. But then it was surprising how much intolerableness a man could tolerate.

Here was one more difficulty for him to meet and conquer.

A lot of people have gone further than they thought they could because someone else thought they could

There is nothing with which every man is so afraid as getting to know how enormously much he is capable of doing and becoming.

Greatly he failed, but he had greatly dared.

Tom felt his darkness. His father was beautiful and clever, his mother was short and mathematically sure. Each of his brothers and sisters had looks or gifts or fortune. Tom loved all of them passionately, but he felt heavy and earth-bound. He climbed ecstatic mountains and floundered in the rocky darkness between the peaks. He had spurts of bravery but they were bracketed in battens of cowardice.

"But I tried though," he says. "Goddammit, I sure as hell did that much, now, didn't I?"