Samuel Morse
An American painter and inventor who contributed to the invention of a single-wire telegraph system and co-developed the Morse code.
Most quoted
"The mere transmission of intelligence is the smallest part of the work of the telegraph. Its great mission is to serve as a bond of peace and friendship between the nations of the earth."
— from Speech, 1868
"This mode of instantaneous communication must inevitably become an instrument of immense power, to be wielded for good or for evil, as it shall be properly or improperly directed."
— from Letter to the Secretary of the Treasury, 1838
"This mode of communication will enable the people of the United States to communicate with each other, and with the government, with a rapidity and certainty hitherto unknown."
— from Letter to the Secretary of the Treasury, 1838
All quotes by Samuel Morse (396)
The meaning of life is to find your gift. The purpose of life is to give it away.
Happiness is not something ready made. It comes from your own actions.
The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.
Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures.
Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.
The highest form of pure thought is in the realm of mathematics.
There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.
The greatest wealth is to live content with little.
It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is most adaptable to change.
The present system of education in our country is a system of public robbery.
Popery is a political system, despotic in its organization, and intolerant in its principles.
The Roman Catholic Church is a political engine, and a most dangerous one.
The object of the Papacy is to subvert our free institutions.
There is a conspiracy against the liberties of the United States.
The immigration of foreigners is a serious evil, and ought to be checked.
The ballot box is the most dangerous weapon in the hands of an ignorant and unprincipled populace.
Universal suffrage, without universal education, is a curse.
The telegraph is destined to bind the nations of the earth in a common brotherhood.
The magnetic telegraph will be the means of spreading the Gospel to the ends of the earth.
The press is the most powerful engine of public opinion.
Contemporaries of Samuel Morse
Other Inventions born within 50 years of Samuel Morse (1791–1872).