Category — Quotes

But the best proof that the danger of overpruning is a bugaboo is the extraordinary effectiveness so often attained by severely ill or severely handicapped people.
A good example was Harry Hopkins, President Roosevelt’s confidential adviser in World War II. A dying, indeed almost a dead man for whom every step was a torment, he could only work a few hours every other day or so. This forced him to cut out everything but truly vital matters. He did not lose effectiveness thereby; on the contrary, he became, as Churchill called him once, ‘Lord Heart of the Matter’ and accomplished more than anyone else in wartime Washington."

(I cannot count the number of times that illustration has come into my mind at critical moments. I determined to ruthlessly cut away whatever was not crucial to the task, asking myself repeatedly, "If I had two hours per day or ten hours per week to this job, what specific things would I do and what would I not do? As Drucker indicates in many , no matter how much wise pruning one does, the information worker will always have much more to do than he can possibly get to. as much as possible must be delegated to others.) Harold Myra, Leaders, Word Books, Waco, TX, p. 21, 1987

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. — Robert A. Heinlein, The Notebooks of Lazarus Long

Fear less, hope more;
Whine less, breathe more;
Hate less, love more;
And all good things are yours. — Anonymous
We aren’t what we eat. We are what we don’t shit. — Hugh Romney

In creating, the only hard thing’s to begin; a grass-blade’s no easier to make than an oak. – James Russell Lowell, 1819-1891

Almost all absurdity of conduct arises from the imitation of those whom we cannot resemble. – Dr. Samuel Johnson, 1709-1784

Everyone is responsible and no one is to blame. — Will Schutz

Fortune befriends the bold. – John Dryden

Fortune favors the audacious. – Erasmus

In great straits, when hope is small, the boldest counsels are the safest. – Livy

Don’t stand shivering upon the bank; plunge in at once, and have it over. – Sam Slick

Only the bold get to the top. – Publilius Syrus

It is better to err on the side of daring than the side of caution. – Alvin Toffler

To achieve great things we must live as though we were never going to die. – Marquis de Vauvenarques

Be bold — and mighty forces will come to your aid. — Basil King

Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. Security does not exist in nature, nor to the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than exposure — Helen Keller

A good book should leave you… slightly exhausted at the end. You live several lives while reading it. — William Styron, interview, Writers at Work, 1958

When I get a little money, I buy books and if any is left, I buy food and clothes. — Erasmus

If you are living a hum-drum life, and you do nothing to change it, ten years from now you will be a product of ten more years of hum-drumidness." — David Campbell
Disorder and procrastination help avoid boredom; one never has the feeling that there is nothing important to do. — Unknown

Boredom is a sickness the cur for which is work; pleasure is only a palliative. — Luc Duc de Levis (d. 1787), Memoires

A

Accomplishment
When you get to the top of the mountain, your first inclination is not to jump for joy, but to look around. — James Carville

The greatest pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do. — Walter Bagehot

I didn’t bite off more than I could chew — it just grew in my mouth. — Dr. Robert Ballard

Almost everything that is great has been done by youth. – Benjamin Disraeli, 1804-1881

Accountability
Everyone needs a bottom line of some sort; everyone needs to be responsible, accountable to whomever it is they are serving. — Bob Buford

We shall never learn to know ourselves except by endeavoring to know God;
for, beholding His greatness, we realize our own littleness; His purity
shows us our foulness; and by meditating upon His humility we find how very far we are from being humble. — Teresa of Avila (1515-1582)

Accuracy
A little inaccuracy sometimes saves tons of explanation. — H.H. Munro, 1924

Achievement
The best things and best people rise out of their separateness. I’m against a homogenized society because I want the cream to rise." — Robert Frost

Action
The greatest pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do. – Walter Bagehot

Nothing is more terrible than activity without insight. – Thomas Carlyle

Talk doesn’t cook rice. – Chinese Proverb

Hell, there are not rules here – we’re trying to accomplish something. – Thomas Edison

First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do. – Epictetus

To dispose a soul to action we must upset its equilibrium. – Eric Hoffer

Deliberate with caution, but act with decision; and yield with graciousness or oppose with firmness. – Charles Hole

It is motive alone that gives character to the actions of men. – Jean de la Brukere

I have always thought the actions of men the best interpreters of their thoughts. – John Locke

There comes a moment when you have to stop revving up the car and shot it into gear
A thought which does not result in an action is nothing much, and an action which does not proceed from a thought is nothing at all. — Georges Bernanos

I do not believe in fate that falls on men however they act;
but I do believe in fate that falls on them unless they act.
–G K Chesterton, _Generally Speaking_

An ounce of action is worth a ton of theory. — Friedrich Engels

The time for action is past! Now is the time for senseless bickering! — Ashleigh Brilliant

The great end of life is not knowledge but action. — Thomas Henry Huxley, "Technical Education," 1887

Deliberation is the action of the many; action is the function of one. — Charles de Gaulle, War Memoirs, 1960

Determine never to be idle. No person will have occasion to complain of the want of time who never loses any. It is wonderful how much may be done if we are always doing. — Thomas Jefferson to Martha Jefferson, May 5, 1787

Truth divorced from experience will always dwell in the realms of doubt." — Henry Drause

Don’t do nothing just because you can’t do everything. — Bob Pierce

Do what you can, with what you have, where you are. — Theodore Roosevelt

"Do-so" is more important than "say-so" — Pete Seeger

No man can tame a tiger into a kitten by stroking it. There can be no appeasement with ruthlessness. There can be no reasoning with an incendiary bomb. — Franklin D. Roosevelt, Fireside Chat, December 29, 1940

One does what one is; one becomes what one does. – Robert von Musil, 1880-1942

Adapting
As he grew older my dad’s pants kept creeping up on him. By 65 he was just a pair of pants and a head. — Jeff Altman

A great many people think they are thinking when they are really rearranging their prejudices and superstitions. — Edward R. Murrow

Addictions
I ain’t got to. But I can’t help it. — William Faulkner

Adversity/ Suffering
Integrity is keeping my commitments even if the circumstances when I made those commitments have changed. — David Jeremiah

If I have learned anything, I owe it neither to precepts nor to books, but to a few opportune misfortunes. Perhaps the school of misfortune is the very best. — Louise Honorine de Choiseul (1734-1801)

The dark night of the soul comes just before revelation. When everything is lost, and all seems darkness, then comes the new life and all that is needed. — Joseph Campbell

When I hear somebody sigh, "Life is hard," I am always tempted to ask, "Compared to what?" — Sydney J. Harris

You don’t have to suffer to be a poet. Adolescence is enough suffering for anyone. — John Ciardi

Those whom God loveth he allows to have the snot kicked out of. — Plaque over the desk of Jamie Buckingham

People build most nobly when limitations are at their greatest. — Frank Lloyd Wright

There is no inherent problem in our desire to escalate our goals, as long as we enjoy the struggle along the way. — Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience

Adversity introduces a man to himself. – Anonymous
He knows not his own strength that hath not met adversity. – Ben Jonson, 1573-1637

Advice
Love all, trust a few. Do wrong to none . — Shakespeare

Advice is judged by results, not by intentions. – Cicero

Whatever advice you give, be short. – Horace

He is bad that will not take advice, but he is a thousand times worse who takes every advice. – Irish Proverb

You will always find a few Eskimos ready to tell the Congolese how to cope with the heat. – Stanislaw Lec

Good counsel has no price. – Buiseppe Mazzini

Many receive advice, few profit by it. – Publilius Surus

Advice what we ask for when we already know the answer, but wish we didn’t. – Unknown

Adulthood
Adults are always asking children what they want to be when they grow up — they’re looking for ideas. — Paula Poundstone

Aggresivity
The firstest gets the mostest. — Nathan Bedford Forrest, Civil War General

The unforgivable crime is soft hitting. Do not hit at all if it can be avoided. – Theodore Roosevelt, 1913

The first blow is half the battle. – Oliver Goldsmith, 1728-1774

You may be disappointed if you fail, but you are doomed if you don’t try. – Beverly Sills, 1929-

Aging
To me, old age is always fifteen years older than I am. — Bernard Baruch

We don’t stop having fun when we’re old; we’re old when we stop having fun. — unknown

No matter how old you get, if you can keep the desire to be creative, you’re keeping the man-child alive. — John Cassavetes

Source: Harper Book of Quotations, Harper 1993
Hope I die before I get old. — Pete Townsend

"There’s no peer pressure." — Unknown, Woman’s response to being asked about the benefits of turning 102.

The old believe everything; the middle-aged suspect everything; the young know everything. — Oscar Wilde, "Phrases and Philosophies for the Use of the Young," 1894

The young man who has not wept is a savage, and the older man who will not laugh is a fool. — George Santayana, Dialogues in Limbo, 1925

Old age lives minutes slowly, hours quickly; childhood chews hours and swallows minutes. – Malcolm de Chazal, 1902-1981

A person is always startled when he hears himself seriously called an old man for the first time. – Oliver W. Holmes, Sr., 1806-1894

Altruism
He who wishes to secure the good of others has already secured his own. – Confucius

Ambition
Ah, but a man’s reach should exceed his grasp, or what’s a heaven for? — Robert Browning, Andrea del Sarto, 1855

Early to rise and early to bed makes a man healthy, wealthy and dead. — James Thurber, Fables for our Times, 1940

One often passes from love to ambition but rarely returns from ambition to love. — La Rochefoucauld, Reflections, 1665

A man may be so much of everything that he is nothing of anything. – Dr. Samuel Johnson, 1709-1784

Time was when I could not sleep for ambition. I thought of nothing but fame but immorality. I could not bear the idea of dying and being forgotten. – Anthony Ashley Cooper

The significance of a man is not in what he attains but rather in what he long to attain. – Kahlil Gibran

Where ambition ends happiness begins. – Hungarian Proberb

Throw away all ambition beyond that of doing the day’s work well. – William Osler

My success so far has only been won by absolute indifference to my future career. – Theodore Roosevelt
America

America may be unique in being a country which has leapt from barbarism to decadence without touching civilization. — John O’Hara

Anger
In the midst of great joy, do not promise anyone anything. In the midst of great anger, do not answer anyone’s letter. – Chinese Proverb

A man is as big as the things that make him angry. – Winston Churchill

When anger rises, think of the consequences. – Confucius

He who restrains his anger overcomes his greatest enemy. – Latin Proverb

The best cure for anger is delay. – Seneca

Never get angry except on purpose. – Unknown Japanese Diplomat

When angry count to ten; when very angry count to one hundred." — Thomas Jefferson

When angry, count to five; when very angry, swear. — Mark Twain

You can’t shake hands with a clinched fist. — Indira Gandhi

Of the Seven Deadly Sins, anger is possibly the most fun. To lick your wounds, to smack your lips over grievances long past, to roll over your tongue the prospect of bitter confrontations still to come, to savor to the last toothsome morsel both the pain you are given and the pain you are giving back — in many ways it is a feast fit for a king. The chief drawback is that what you are wolfing down is yourself. The skeleton at the feast is you. — Frederick Buechner

Animals
I care not much for a man’s religion whose dog and cat are not the better for it. — Abraham Lincoln

The greatness of a nation can be judged by the way its animals are treated. — Mahatma Gandhi

It is just like man’s vanity and impertinence to call an animal dumb because it is dumb to his dull perceptions. — Mark Twain

Cats are intended to teach us that not everything in nature has a function. — Garison Keillor

A veterinarian can learn a lot about a dog owner he has never met by just observing the dog. – Stephen Brown

Anxiety
Anxiety is unbelief in disguise. — Don Hawkins

Anxiety is like sand in an oyster; a few grains produce a pearl, too many, kill. — saying

There is not such thing as pure pleasure; some anxiety always goes with it. — Ovid (d. A.D. 1), Metamorphasis

Appreciation
We know the worth of a thing when we have lost it. — French Proverb

Arguments
The aim of argument or discussion should not be victory, but progress. — Joseph Joubert, Pensees, 1842

"Arguments with furniture are rarely productive." — Kehlog Albran, "The Profit"

The time for action is past! Now is the time for senseless bickering! — Ashleigh Brilliant

Army
The Army has carried the American … ideal to its logical conclusion. Not only do they prohibit discrimination on the grounds of race, creed and color, but also on ability. — T. Lehrer

The Army needs leaders the way a foot needs a big toe. — Bill Murray

Art / Artists
Artist: Someone who produces things that people don’t need to have but that he — for some good reason — thinks it would be a good idea to give them. — Andy Warhol

Asking for Help
If there is something to gain and nothing to lose by asking, by all means ask! — W. Clement Stone

Tell everyone what you want to do and someone will want to help you do it. — W. Clement Stone

Whether we like it or not, asking is the rule of the Kingdom. — C. H. Spurgeon

You don’t always get what you ask for, but you never get what you don’t ask for… unless it’s contagious! — Franklyn Broude

Basically most people want to give. They almost encourage you to ask. — Brad Winch

You’ve got to ask! Asking is, in my opinion, the world’s most powerful — and neglected — secret to success and happiness. — Percy Ross

We find what we expect to find, and we receive what we ask for. — Elbert Hubbard

Whether we like it or not, asking is the rule of the Kingdom. — C. H. Spurgeon

Many things are lost for want of asking. — English Proverb

Know how to ask. There is nothing more difficult for some people. Nor for others, easier. — Baltasar Gracian
If you don’t ask, you don’t get. – Ghandi

Attempts
You may be disappointed if you fail, but you are doomed if you don’t try. – Beverly Sills, 1929-

Attitude
Live out of your imagination, not your history. — Stephen Covey

Productivity is a function of attitude, and cost is a function of productivity. So it all comes down to attitude. — John Charvat, Zebco

Develop a healthy disrespect for the impossible. — Gene Hoffman, Super Valu

We’re lost, but we’re making good time! – Yogi Berra

Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist. – Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1803-1882

He gives twice who give promptly. – Publilius Syrus, first century B.C.

It is the property of fools to be always judging. – Thomas Fuller, 1654-1734

I’d do it differently if I had another chance. I’d make a positive and sustained attempt to use judicious praise rather than find fault, to warmly accept rather than critique. Most of the people I know up close need a break. — Jim McGuiggan, Jesus, Hero of Thy Soul,

Authenticity
Never apologize for showing feeling. When you do so you apologize for truth. –Benjamin Disraeli

One’s real life is often the life that one does not lead. – Ocsar Wilde, 1854-1900

Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else’s opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation. – Oscar Wilde, 1854-1900