Famous Quotes & Sayings

Samuel Johnson

Few enterprises of great labor or hazard would be undertaken if we had not the power of magnifying the advantages we expect from them.

Samuel Johnson

If a man does not make new acquaintances as he advances through life, he will soon find himself left alone. A man, sir, should keep his friendship in a constant repair.

Samuel Johnson

Books like friends, should be few and well-chosen.

Samuel Johnson

If lawyers were to undertake no causes till they were sure they were just, a man might be precluded altogether from a trial of his claim, though, were it judicially examined, it might be found a very just claim.

Wallace Stevens

After the final no there comes a yes and on that yes the future of the world depends

Wallace Stevens

The most beautiful thing in the world is, of course, the world itself.

Vivien Leigh

I'm not a film star, I am an actress. Being a film star is such a false life, lived for fake values and for publicity.

Virgil

Look with favor upon a bold beginning.

Virgil

People are able because they think they're able

William Henry Harrison

All the lessons of history and experience must be lost upon us if we are content to trust alone to the peculiar advantages we happen to possess.

William Howard Taft

Don't write so that you can be understood, write so that you can't be misunderstood.

William Howard Taft

We must dare to be great; and we must realize that greatness is the fruit of toil and sacrifice and high courage.

Willa Cather

Old men are like that, you know. It makes them feel important to think they are in love with somebody.

Washington Irving

If I can, by a lucky chance, in these uneasy days, rub out one wrinkle from the brow of care, or beguile the heavy heart of one moment of sadness; if I can, how and then, prompt a happier view of human nature, and make my reader more in good humor with his fellow-beings and himself, surely, I shall not have written in vain.

Washington Irving

Some minds seem almost to create themselves, springing up under every disadvantage and working their solitary but irresistible way through a thousand obstacles.

Washington Irving

Little minds are tamed and subdued by misfortune; but great minds rise above them.

Washington Irving

Great minds have purposes; others have wishes.

Walter Lippmann

Unless the reformer can invent something which substitutes attractive virtues for attractive vices, he will fail.

Walter Lippmann

The final test of a leader is that he leaves behind him in other men the conviction and the will to carry on.

Walter Lippmann

It requires wisdom to understand wisdom: the music is nothing if the audience is deaf.

Voltaire

Most of my life has been one tragedy after another, most of which hasn't happened.

Voltaire

Chance is a word void of sense; nothing can exist without a cause.

Voltaire

It is not sufficient to see and to know the beauty of a work. We must feel and be affected by it.

Voltaire

Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd.

Voltaire

Paradise is where I am

Voltaire

The husband who decides to surprise his wife is often very much surprised himself.

Voltaire

Je ne suis pas d'accord avec ce que vous dites, mais je d‚fendrai jusqu'... la mort le droit que vous avez de le dire/ I do not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it

Voltaire

No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking.

Voltaire

It is dangerous to be right in matters on which the established authorities are wrong.

Voltaire

The best is the enemy of the good.

Voltaire

Man is free at the moment he wishes to be.

Voltaire

Life is thickly sown with thorns, and I know no other remedy than to pass quickly through them. The longer we dwell on our misfortunes, the greater is their power to harm us.

Voltaire

I hate women because they always know where things are.