“The condition of all progress is experience. We go wrong a thousand times before we find the right path.”

— Felix Adler, Life and Destiny (1913)

About Felix Adler

1851 – 1933

German-born American educator, founder of the Ethical Culture movement.

“Love is the expansion of two natures in such fashion that each includes the other, each is enriched by the other.”

“The rudder of our ship has ceased to move obedient to the helm.”

“Where the roots of private virtue are diseased, the fruit of public probity cannot but be corrupt.”

“Experience is simply the name we give our mistakes.”

“Progress is the exploration of our own error.”

Attribution note: Source disputed or unverified.

“A mistake is only a mistake if you don't learn from it.”

Attribution note: Source disputed or unverified.

“Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.”

“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.”

“I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it.”