Russell Conwell

Russell H. Conwell (February 15, 1843 – December 6, 1925) was an American Baptist minister who was the founder and first president of Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He delivered the lecture Acres of Diamonds thousands of times in the 1880s and 1890s. This lecture was subsequently published as a book.

Acres of Diamonds (1915)
Full text here. New York, Harper & Brothers.


 * I say that you ought to get rich, and it is our duty to get rich.


 * To make money honestly is to preach the gospel.


 * A man is not really a true man until he owns his own home, and they that own their homes are made more honorable and honest and pure, true and economical and careful, by owning the home.


 * There is not a poor person in the United States who was not made poor by his own shortcomings, or by the shortcomings of someone else. It is all wrong to be poor, anyhow.


 * Love is the grandest thing on God's earth, but fortunate the lover who has plenty of money.