Nick’s Favorite Quotations
“When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single
bit of talent left, and could say, ‘I used everything You gave me.’” E. Bombeck
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the earth and everything that's in it,
And—which is more—you'll be a Man, my son!
Rudyard Kipling
“I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore and diverting myself in now and
then finding a smoother pebble or prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay
all undiscovered before me.” Isaac Newton
“The most important thing I learned is that soldiers watch what their leaders do. You can give
them classes and lecture them forever, but it is your personal example they will follow.” Colin
Powell
“Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, ‘Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?’
And I said, ‘Here I am. Send me!’” Isaiah 6:8
“Who you are speaks so loudly, I cannot hear what you are saying.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
“The only thing you have to fear is fear itself.” Franklin Delano Roosevelt
“I don't measure a man's success by how high he climbs but by how high he bounces when he
hits bottom.” General George S. Patton
“I do not fear failure. I only fear the “slowing up” of the engine inside of me which is pounding,
saying, “Keep going, someone must be on top, why not you?” General George S. Patton
Only to the extent that we expose ourselves over and over to annihilation can that which is
indestructible be found in us. Unknown
“Some men see things as they are and say ‘why.’ I dream things that never were and say ‘why
not?’” George Bernard Shaw
“Lead me, follow me, or get out of my way.” General George S. Patton Jr.
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Character
“When a man has strong qualities of leadership, but is of low moral character, there is always the
danger that his subordinates will be influenced by his bad characteristics, to the detriment of the
leader and of the group. But if the leader is a man of strong qualities of leadership and high
moral character, he will endure and he will achieve better results.” Edgar F. Puryear
“Don’t say things. What you are stands over you the while, and thunders so that I cannot hear
what you say to the contrary.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
“If I can’t go back with my self-respect, I won’t go back at all.” Captain Theodore Harris,
USAF
“A man has integrity if his interest in the good of the service is at all times greater than his
personal pride, and when he holds himself to the same line of duty when unobserved as he would
follow if his superiors were present” General S.L.A. Marshall
“Integrity is the fundamental premise for military service in a free society. Without integrity, the
moral pillars of our military strength, public trust, and self-respect are lost.” Charles A. Gabriel
“Try not to become a man of success but rather try to become a man of values.” Albert Einstein
“Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
“It is not necessary that whilst I live I live happily; but it is necessary that so long as I live I
should live honourably." Immanuel Kant
“I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to
live by the light that I have. I must stand with anybody that stands right, stand with him while he
is right, and part with him when he goes wrong.” Abraham Lincoln
“You can't help what you were born and you may not have much to say about where you die, but
you can and you should try to pass the days in between as a good man.” Sam Damon
“Character isn’t inherited. One builds it daily by how one thinks and acts…” Helen Gahagan
Douglas
“Truth does not become more true by virtue of the fact that the entire world agrees with it, nor
less so even if the whole world disagrees with it.” Maimonides
Leadership and Duty
“If I do my full duty, the rest will take care of itself.” General George S. Patton Jr.
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“Duty, then, is the sublimest word in the English language. You should do your duty in all
things. You can never do more. You should never wish to do less.” General Robert E. Lee
“Be an example to your men, in your duty and in private life. Never spare yourself and
let your troops see that you don’t in your endurance of fatigue and privation. Always be
tactful and well-mannered. Avoid excessive sharpness or harshness of voice, which
usually indicates the man who has shortcomings of his own to hide.” German Field
Marshal Erwin Rommel
“Hold yourself responsible for a higher standard than anybody else expects of you. Never
excuse yourself.” Henry Ward Beecher
“As
each man's strength gives out, as it no longer responds to his will, the inertia of the whole
gradually comes to rest on the commander's will alone. The ardor of his spirit must rekindle the
flame of purpose in all others; his inward fire must revive their hope.” Carl von Clausewitz, On
War
“Officers must be made to care for their men. That is the sole duty of all officers.” General
George S. Patton Jr.
“There is only one duty, only one safe course, and that is to try to be right.” Winston Churchill
“True genius resides in the capacity for evaluation of uncertain, hazardous, and conflicting
information.” Winston Churchill
“Trust men and they will be true to you; treat them greatly and they will show themselves great.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Work is victory.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Loneliness is the penalty of leadership, but the man who has to make the decisions is assisted
greatly if he feels that there is no uncertainty in the minds of those who follow him, and that his
orders will be carried out confidently and in the expectation of success.” Sir Ernest Shackleton,
South
“If you want to be important – wonderful. If you want to be recognized – wonderful. If you want
to be great – wonderful. But recognize that he who is greatest among you shall be your servant.
That's a new definition of greatness.
And this morning, the thing that I like about it: by giving that definition of greatness, it means
that everybody can be great, because everybody can serve. You don't have to have a college
degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject and your verb agree to serve. You don't
have to know about Plato and Aristotle to serve. You don't have to know Einstein's theory of
relativity to serve. You don't have to know the second theory of thermodynamics in physics to
serve. You only need a heart full of grace, a soul generated by love. And you can be that
servant.” Martin Luther King Jr.
“Always do everything you ask of those you command.” George S. Patton
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"A true leader has the confidence to stand alone, the courage to make tough decisions, and the
compassion to listen to the needs of others. He does not set out to be a leader, but becomes one
by the quality of his actions and the integrity of his intent. In the end, leaders are much like
eagles... they don't flock, you find them one at a time." Unknown
"Of all my accomplishments I may have achieved during the war, I am proudest of the fact that I
never lost a wingman." Colonel Erich 'Bubi' Hartmann, GAF
"Victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory however long and hard the road may be;
for without victory there is no survival." Sir Winston Churchill
“Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.”
Abraham Lincoln
"There is a difference between us. You think the people of this country exist to provide you with
position. I think your position exists to provide those people with freedom. And I go to make
sure that they have it." William Wallace to the nobles of Scotland
"Inevitably, that which makes you extraordinary will make you lonely." (Unknown ?)
"Be shepards of God's flock that is under your care, serving as overseers—not because you
must, but because you are willing, as God wants you to be; not greedy for money, but eager
to serve; not lording it over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock. And
when the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the crown of glory that will never fade
away." 1 Peter 5:2-4
“Regard your soldiers as your children, and they will follow you into the deepest valleys. Look
on them as your beloved sons, and they will stand by you even unto death! If, however, you are
indulgent, but unable to make your authority felt; kind-hearted, but unable to enforce your
commands; and incapable, moreover, of quelling disorder: then your soldiers must be likened to
spoilt children; they are useless for any practical purpose.” Sun Tzu
“To see the right and not do it is cowardice.” Confucius
“"There's a great deal of talk about loyalty from the bottom to the top. Loyalty from the top down
is even more necessary and is much less prevalent. One of the most frequently noted
characteristics of great men who have remained great is loyalty to their subordinates.” General
George S. Patton Jr.
“A man does not have himself killed for a half-pence a day or for a petty distinction. You must
speak to the soul in order to electrify him.” Napoleon Bonaparte
“Read over and over again the campaigns of Alexander, Hannibal, Caesar, Gustavus, Turenne,
Eugene and Frederic…This is the only way to become a great general and master the secrets of
the art of war…” Napoleon Bonaparte
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“From now until the end of the world, we and it shall be remembered. We few, we happy few,
we band of brothers. For he today that sheds his blood with me, Shall be my brother; be ne'er so
vile, This day shall gentle his condition. And gentlemen in England now abed, Shall think
themselves accursed they were not here, And hold their manhood's cheap whiles any speaks,
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.” William Shakespeare
“Each of us has a spark of life inside us, and our highest endeavor ought to be to set of that spark
in another.” Kenny Ausubel
“Leaders must be seen to be up front, up to date, up to their job and up early in the morning.”
Marcus Sieff
“Let others lead small lives, but not you. Let others argue over small things, but not you. Let
others cry over small hurts, but not you. Let others leave their future in someone else’s hands,
but not you.” Jim Rohn
“A candle loses nothing by lighting another candle.” Erin Majors
“If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a
leader.” John Quincy Adams
“The influence of each human beings on others in this life is a kind of immortality.” John
Quincy Adams
“There’s nothing so rewarding as to make people realize they are worthwhile in this world.” Bob
Anderson
“There are three kinds of people: Those who are immovable, those who are moveable, and those
who move them.” Li Hung
“If you treat a man as he is, he will stay as he is. If you treat him as if he were what he ougt to
be, and could be, he will become a bigger and better man.” Goethe
“You have not lived a perfect day, even though you have earned your money, unless you have
done something for someone who will never be able to repay you.” Ruth Schmeltzer
“There's nothing so rewarding as to make people realize they are worthwhile in this world.” Bob
Anderson
Military and War
“Not to promote war, but to preserve peace.” Elihu Root
“To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace.” George
Washington
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O God of battles! steel my soldiers' hearts;
Possess them not with fear; take from them now
The sense of reckoning, if the opposed numbers
Pluck their hearts from them.
Henry V, Act IV, Scene 1
“War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and
patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has
nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal
safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the
exertions of better men than himself.” John Stuart Mills
“Without a word this uniform also whispers of freezing troops, injured bodies, and Americans
left forever in foreign fields. It documents every serviceman’s courage, who by accepting this
uniform, promises the one gift he truly has to give: his life. I wear my uniform for the heritage
of sacrifice it represents and more. I wear my uniform with pride, for it represents the greatest
nation of free people in the world.” Captain Karen Dorman Kimmel
“In every battle there comes a time when both sides consider themselves beaten; then he who
continues the attack wins.” General Ulysses S. Grant
“War makes extremely heavy demands on the soldier’s strength and nerves. For this reason,
make heavy demands on your men in peacetime exercises.” German Field Marshall Erwin
Rommel
Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of
supporting it. Thomas Paine, Common Sense
We do not seek peace in order to be at war, but we go to war that we may have peace. Be
peaceful, therefore, in warring, so that you may vanquish those whom you war against, and bring
them to the prosperity of peace. St. Augustine
“First There…That Others May Live.” Air Force Special Operations Motto
“Tell them of us and say,
For their tomorrow,
We gave our today.” The Kohima Epitaph
“Hard pressed on my right. My center is yielding. Impossible to maneuver. Situation excellent. I
am attacking.” Ferdinand Foch at the Battle of the Marne
“People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence
on their behalf.” George Orwell
“In war there is no substitute for victory.” Gen Douglas MacArthur
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“I am a soldier, I fight where I am told, and I win where I fight.” General George S. Patton Jr.
Are you willing to make the ultimate sacrifice for your country? Tell me you are and I will fight
with you. Tell me you are not and I will fight for you. Alexandra Quest
“It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men
lived.” George S. Patton
“Better to fight for something than live for nothing.” George S. Patton
"I must study politics and war, that my sons may have the liberty to study mathematics and
philosophy...in order to give their children the right to study painting, poetry, and music." John
Adams
"I offer neither pay, nor quarters, nor food; I offer only hunger, thirst, forced marches, battles,
and death. Let him who loves his country with his heart, and not merely with his lips, follow
me." Giuseppe Garibaldi
"War is a world apart, where life itself is at stake, where human nature is reduced to its elemntal
forms, where self-interest and necessity prevail. Here men and women do what they must to
save themselves and their communities, and morality and law have no place." Michael Walzer
These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this
crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and
thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this
consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain
too cheap, we esteem too lightly; it is dearness only that gives everything its value. Heaven
knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed, if so celestial an
article as Freedom should not be highly rated. Thomas Paine, Common Sense
Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a
theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed. Dwight D.
Eisenhower
"My religious belief teaches me to feel as safe in battle as in bed. God has fixed the time for
my death, I do not concern myself with that. But to be always ready, whenever it may
overtake me, that is the way all men should live . . . then all men would be equally brave."
Stonewall Jackson
... I serve with the memory and pride of those who have gone before me for they loved to fight,
fought to win and would rather die than quit. NS Creed
“Man may give that which the gods cannot, all he possesses, his life. My own I set down with
joy, for you, friends, who have become the brother I no longer possess.” Alpheus at the Battle
of Thermopylae
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“If there must be trouble let it be in my day, that my child may have peace.” Thomas Paine
"We children of a mechanical age are interested in and impressed by machines to such an extent
that we forget that no machine is better than its operator." George S. Patton Jr.
“When war does come, my advice is to draw the sword and throw away the scabbard.” Stonewall
Jackson
“In the absence of orders, go find something and kill it.” Field Marshall Erwin Rommel
“War is cruelty. There is no use trying to reform it, the crueler it is the sooner it will be over.”
William Tecumseh Sherman
“War is the remedy that our enemies have chosen, and I say let us give them all they want.”
William Tecumseh Sherman
“History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or timid.” Dwight D. Eisenhower
“Go forward until the last round is fired and the last drop of gas is expended...then go forward on
foot!” General George S. Patton Jr.
“It is the unconquerable nature of man and not the nature of the weapon he uses that ensures
victory.” General George S. Patton Jr.
“There is only one tactical principle which is not subject to change. It is to use the means at hand
to inflict the maximum amount of wound, death, and destruction on the enemy in the minimum
amount of time.” General George S. Patton Jr.
“In war there is no second prize for the runner-up.” General Omar N. Bradley
“Arm yourselves, and be ye men of valor, and be in readiness for the conflict; for it is better for
us to perish in battle than to look upon the outrage of our nation and our altar.” Sir Winston S.
Churchill
“In war there is but one favorable moment; the great art is to seize it!” Napoleon Bonaparte
“Cry 'Havoc' and let slip the dogs of War.” William Shakespeare
“We must remember that one man is much the same as another, and that he is best who is trained
in the severest school.” Thucydides
“The Nation that makes a great distinction between its scholars and its warriors will have its
thinking done by cowards and its fighting done by fools.” Thucydides
“It is well that war is so terrible, else we should grow too fond of it.” General Robert E. Lee
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“Wars may be fought with weapons, but they are won by men.” General George S. Patton Jr.
Challenge and Perseverance
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or
where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is
actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly;
who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and
shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the
great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the
triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly,
so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor
defeat.” Theodore Roosevelt
“But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with
wings as eagles.” Isaiah 40:31
“I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little death that brings total obliteration. I
will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I
will turn the inner to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will
remain.” Frank Herbert
“Courage is the power to let go of the familiar.” Raymond Lindquist
“Whatever you do, you need courage. Whatever course you decide upon, there is always
someone to tell you that you are wrong. There are always difficulties arising that tempt you to
believe your critics are right. To map out a course of action and follow it to an end requires some
of the same courage that a soldier needs. Peace has its victories, but it takes brave men and
women to win them.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Sure I am this day we are masters of our fate, that the task which has been set before us is not
above our strength; that its pangs and toils are not beyond our endurance. As long as we have
faith in our own cause and an unconquerable will to win, victory will not be denied us.” Sir
Winston Churchill
“So look up ahead at times to come, despair is not for us. We have a world and more to see,
while this remains behind.” Col. Nick Rowe
“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort, but where he
stands at times of challenge and controversy.” Martin Luther King
“Some succeed because they are destined to; most succeed because they are determined to.”
Unknown
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“I hated every minute of training, but I said, 'Don't quit. Suffer now and live the rest of your life
like a champion.'“ Muhammad Ali
“I know God won't give me anything I can't handle. I just wish he didn't trust me so much.”
Mother Teresa
“Es gibt keine verzweifelten Lagen, es gibt nur verzweifelte Menschen”. (There are no desperate
situations, there are only desperate people).” Heinz Guderian
“Accept the challenges so that you can feel the exhilaration of victory.” George S. Patton
“We have got by due to persistence and on the ability to make plans fit circumstances. The other
armies try to make circumstances fit plans.” George S. Patton
The man on top of the mountain didn't fall there. Unknown
“Pain is temporary. Quitting is forever.” Lance Armstrong
“Something's not going right and there's nothing I can do about that now. All I can do is wake up
every morning and do my best. I'm not going to cry and whine. I'm just going to do my best.”
Lance Armstrong
"Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. It hurts, but that's why you play the game. It's the
challenge of winning." Coach Dave Breschi
"Pain nourishes courage. You can't be brave if you've only had wonderful things happen to you."
Unknown
It is difficulties that show what men are. Epictetus
"Press on: nothing in the world can take place of perseverance. Talent will not; nothing is more
common than unsuccessful men with talent. Education will not; the world is full of educated
derelicts. Persistence and determination are alone omnipotent..."Calvin Coolidge
You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look
fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, "I lived through this horror. I can take the next
thing that comes along." You must do the thing you think you cannot do. Eleanor Roosevelt
"Today I do what others won't, so tomorrow I can do what others can't." Unknown
"Fortune may have yet a better success in reserve for you, and they who lose today may win
tomorrow." Cervantes
"Remember that you have placed all on war. Therefore you must never fail. Hence if you attack
and you should do nothing else put in every man and win or mark the high tide of your charge
with your body. The world has no use for a defeated soldier and nothing too good for a victor.
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Whatever may happen whatever be the temptation to slump into a civilian remember that you
are a soldier and ever seek command. If you die not a soldier and having had a chance to be one
I pray God to damn you George Patton.
Never Never Never stop being ambitious. You have but one life. Live it to the full of glory
and be willing to pay." George S. Patton Jr.
"God keeps his promise, and he will not allow you to be tested beyond your power to remain
firm; at the time you are put to the test, he will give you the strength to endure it." Unknown
"Give me, my God, what you still have; give me what no one asks for. I do not ask for wealth,
nor success, nor even health. People ask you so often, God, for all that, that you cannot have any
left. Give me, my God, what you still have. Give me what people refuse to accept from you. I
want insecurity and disquietude; I want turmoil and brawl. And if you should give them to me,
my God, once and for all, let me be sure to have them always, for I will not always have the
courage to ask for them." Cpl Zirnheld, SAS, 1942
"One day, in retrospect, the years of struggle will strike you as the most beautiful." Sigmund
Freud
"Shall we indeed accept good from God and not accept adversity?" Job 2:10
"Without a struggle, there can be no progress." Frederick Douglas
"A set back is the opportunity to begin again more intelligently." Henry Ford
"Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know
that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that
you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything." James 1:2-4
"Bravery is being the only one who knows you're afraid." David Hackworth
"We are not now that strength which in old days moved earth and heaven,
that which we are, we are,
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield."
Ulysses, Alfred Lord Tennyson
"It is easier to find men who will volunteer to die, than to find those who are willing to endure
pain with patience." Julius Caesar
"No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will
not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the
way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it." 1 Corinthians 10:13
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"If I care to listen to every criticism, let alone act on them, then this shop may as well be closed
for all other businesses. I have learned to do my best, and if the end result is good then I do not
care for any criticism, but if the end result is not good, then even the praise of ten angels would
not make the difference." Abraham Lincoln
“He whose walk is blameless, who does what is righteous, speaks the truth...casts no slur on his
fellow man...who keeps his oath even when it hurts...He who does these things will never be
shaken!” Psalms 15
"This is my body. And I can do whatever I want to it. I can push it. Study it. Tweak it. Listen to
it. Everybody wants to know what I'm on. What am I on? I'm on my bike busting my ass six
hours a day. What are you on?" Lance Armstrong
“If you are going to win any battle, you have to do one thing. You have to make the mind run the
body. Never let the body tell the mind what to do... the body is never tired if the mind is not
tired.” General George S. Patton Jr.
“Courage is rightly esteemed the first of human qualities, because it is the quality that guarantees
all others.” Sir Winston S. Churchill
“You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word. It is victory. Victory at all costs. Victory
in spite of all terrors. Victory, however long and hard the road may be, for without victory there
is no survival.” Sir Winston S. Churchill
“Sure I am this day we are masters of our fate, that the task which has been set before us is not
above our strength; that its pangs and toils are not beyond our endurance. As long as we have
faith in our own cause and an unconquerable will to win, victory will not be denied us.” Sir
Winston S. Churchill
“You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than live
as slaves.” Sir Winston S. Churchill
“How many things apparently impossible have nevertheless been performed by resolute men
who had no alternative but death.” Napoleon Bonaparte
“If the leader is filled with high ambition and if he pursues his aims with audacity and strength of
will, he will reach them in spite of all obstacles.” Karl von Clausewitz
“What lies before you, what lies behind you, pales in significance with what lies within you!”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
“We need to learn to set our course by the stars, not by the lights of every passing ship.” Omar
Bradley
“Do not let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do.” John Wooden
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“Opportunity is missed by most because is it dressed in overalls and looks like work.” Thomas
Edison
“The difficulties and struggles of today are but the price we must pay for the accomplishments
and victories of tomorrow.” Willian J.H. Boetcker
"Things have a way of working themselves out – even when we go out of our way to plan to the
contrary." Pacey Whitter
“To have courage for whatever comes in life – everything lies in that.” St. Teresa of Avila
Attitude
“If a man does his best, what else is there?” George S. Patton Jr
“Happiness is found not in doing what one likes to do, but in liking what one has to do.” Sir
James M. Barrie
“The only limiting factor is your mind.” Arnold Schwarzenegger
A man said to the universe:
“Sir, I exist!”
“However,” replied the universe,
“The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation.” Stephen Crane
“The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on my life. To me, attitude is more
important than facts. It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than
circumstances, than falures, than successes, than what other people think or say or do. It is more
important than appearance, giftedness or skill. It will make or break a company...a church...a
home. The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the attitude we will
embrace for that day. We cannot change our past...we cannot change the fact that people act in a
certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play in the string we
have, and that is our attitude. I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how i
react to it. And so it is with you...we are in charge of our attitudes.” Charles Swindoll
“Do your damnedest in an ostentatious manner all the time.” General George S. Patton Jr.
“What we see depends on what we look for.” Sir John Lubbock
“If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which
he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.” Henry David
Thoreau
“Never lose an opportunity of seeing anything that is beautiful; for beauty is God's handwriting –
a wayside sacrament. Welcome it in every fair face, in every fair sky, in every fair flower, and
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thank God for it as a cup of blessing.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and
absurdities no doubt crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; begin it
well and serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.” Ralph
Waldo Emerson
“The question is not how far. The question is; do you possess the constitution, the depth of faith,
to go as far as is needed?” Boondock Saints
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.
Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be,
and whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.
Desiderata
“Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence.”
Desiderata
“Everything that's worth doing is worth doing right.” Raoul Duke
“So many tangles in life are ultimately hopeless that we have no appropriate sword other than
laughter.” Gordon William Allport
“Watch what people are cynical about, and one can often discover what they lack.” George S.
Patton
“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the
ones you did. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds
in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” Mark Twain
"God chooses what we go through; we choose how we go through it." John C. Maxwell
"To be pleased with one's limits is a wretched state." Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
“To laugh often and love much... to appreciate beauty, to find the best in others, to give one's
self... this is to have succeeded.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Don't bother just to be better than your contemporaries or predecessors. Try to be better than
yourself.” William Faulkner
"History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it." Winston Churchill
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"I don't know whether this is the best of times or the worst of times, but I assure you it's the only
time you've got." Art Buchwald
“We are defined by what we do repeatedly, therefore excellence is a habit, not an act.” Aristotle
"Can any of you by worrying increase your life-span a single moment?" Matthew 6:27
“I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I intended to
be.” Douglas Adams
"Know what it is to be a child...to see the world in a grain of sand and heaven in a wild flower, to
hold infinity in the palm of your hand and eternity in a hour." William Blake
“You were born an original. Don't die a copy.” John Mason
“How happy is the little stone, that rambles in the road alone, and doesn't care about careers, and
exigencies never fears; whose coat is elemental brown, a passing universe put on, and
independent as the sun, associates or glows alone, fulfilling absolute decree, in casual
simplicity.” Emily Dickinson
"The most wasted of all days is one without laughter." E. E. Cummings
"I asked for Strength...And God gave me Difficulties to make me strong.
I asked for Wisdom...And God gave me Problems to solve.
I asked for Prosperity...And God gave me Brain and Brawn to work.
I asked for Courage...And God gave me Danger to overcome.
I asked for Love...And God gave me Troubled people to help.
I asked for Favors...And God gave me Opportunities.
I recieved nothing I wanted. I received everything I needed." Unknown
"What is a weed? A plant whose virtues have not been discovered. " Ralph Waldo Emerson
"In these words I can sum up everything I know about life: it goes on." Robert Frost
"I imagine you are about as happy as you make your mind up to be." Abraham Lincoln
"Your talent is God's gift to you. What you do with it is your gift back to God." Leo Buscaglia
“My business is to teach my aspirations to conform themselves to fact. Not to try and make facts
harmonize with my aspirations.” Thomas H. Huxley
Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be
shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared. Buddha
“The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity. The optimist sees the opportunity in every
difficulty.” Winston Churchill
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"Execute every act of thy life as if it were thy last." Marcus Aurelius
“Smiling away your troubles requires a clear conscience that harbours no insincerity.”
Paramhansa Yogananda
“I am up and about when I am ill, and in the most appalling weather, I am on
horseback when other men would be flat out on their beds, complaining. We
are made for action, and activity is the sovereign remedy for all physical ills.” Frederick the
Great
“There's no security on this earth, only opportunity.” General Douglas MacArthur
“Cowards die many times before their deaths; the valiant never taste death but once.” William
Shakespeare
"The whole earth is the sepulcher of famous men; and their story is graven not only on the stone
over their native earth, but lives on far away, without visible symbol, woven into the stuff of
other men's lives." Pericles' Funeral Oration
“If there is any kindness I can show, or any good I can do to any fellow human being, let me do
it now, and not defer or neglect it, as I shall not pass this way again.” William Penn
“Silent gratitude isn’t much good to anyone.” Gladys Browyn Stern
“No distance of place or lapse of time can lessen the friendship of those who are thoroughly
persuaded of each other’s worth.” Robert Southey
“Wear a smile and have friends; wear a frown and have wrinkles.” George Eliot
“Be content with what you have; rejoice in the way things are. When you realize there is nothing
lacking, the whole world belongs to you.” Lao-tzu
“There is nothing I desire more to be informed of, than of the death of men: that is to say, what
words, what countenance, and what face they show at their death... Were I a composer of books,
I would keep a register, commented of the diverse deaths, which in teaching men to die, should
after teach them to live.” Montaigne
“Nothing in life is to be feared. It is only to be understood.” Marie Curie
“When you talk, you repeat what you already know; when you listen, you often learn
something.” Jared Sparks
“I have learned to use the word impossible with the greatest caution.” Wernher von Braun
“Exuberance is beauty.” William Blake
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“We make a living by what we get, we make a life by what we give.” Winston Churchill
“We have the power, knowledge, and equipment to build a world beyond our wonder. Only loss
of nerve can defeat us.” James Dillet
“Whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to know even one
life has breathed easier because you have lived, this is the meaning of success.” Ralph Waldo
Emerson
Love
“To love. To be loved. To never forget your own insignificance. To never get used to the
unspeakable violence and the vulgar disparity of life around you. To seek joy in the saddest
places. To pursue beauty to its lair. To never simplify what is complicated or complicate what is
simple. To respect strength, never power. Above all, to watch. To try and understand. To never
look away. And never, never to forget.” Arundhati Roy
“I believe that love—not imitation—is the sincerest form of flattery. Your imitator thinks that
you can be duplicated; your lover knows you can’t.” Marilyn vos Savant
“Love doesn’t just sit there, like a stone, it has to be made, like bread; remade all the time, made
new.” Ursula K. LeGuin
“Immature love says: 'I love you because I need you.' Mature love says 'I need you because I
love you.'“ Erich Fromm
“What is love? Ask him who lives, what is life. Ask him who adores, what is God…[Love] is
that powerful attraction towards all that we conceive, or fear, or hope beyond ourselves, when we
find within our thoughts the chasm of an insufficient void, and seek to awaken in all things that
are, a community with what we experience within ourselves.” Percy Bysshe Shelley
“If I have no love…I am nothing…Love is patient; love is kind and envies no one. Love is never
boastful, nor conceited, nor rude; never selfish, not quick to take offense. Love keeps no score
of wrongs; does not gloat over other men’s sins, but delights in the truth…Love will never come
to an end.” 1 Corinthians 13
“To love is to place our happiness in the happiness of another.” G. W. Von Leibnitz
“The bravest are the tenderest, the loving are the daring.” Nitobe
"You don't love a woman because she is beautiful, but she is beautiful because you love her."
Anon
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"Tell me what kind of scale can compare the weight of two beauties?" Ani Difranco
“Love takes off masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within.”
James Baldwin
“This is my one commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has
greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends.” John 15:12-13
"Ama me fideliter! Fidem meam noto: De corde totaliter Et ex mente tota, Sum presentialiter
Absens in remota."
Latin: "Love me faithfully!/See how I am faithful:/With all my heart/And all my soul/I am with
you/Though I am far away."
Anon., Carmina Burana, "Omnia Sol Temperat"
“You come to love not by finding the perfect person, but by seeing an imperfect person
perfectly.” Sam Keen
“The Ultimate good lies not in winning a hundred battles, but in overcoming an enemy without
conflict, through love” Shorin-Ryu Karate Motto
“Assuredly there is but one way in which to achieve what is not merely difficult but utterly
against human nature: to love those who hate us, to repay their evil deeds with benefits, to return
blessings for reproaches. It is that we remember not to consider men's evil intention but to look
upon the image of God in them, which cancels and effaces their transgressions, and with its
beauty and dignity allures us to love and embrace them.” John Calvin
“Life in abundance comes only through great love.” Elbert Hubbard
“Love is an irresistible desire to be irresistibly desired.” Robert Frost
“How bold one gets when one is sure of being loved.” Sigmund Freud
“You don’t marry the person you can spend the rest of your life with, you marry the person you
can't live your life without.” Unknown
“A love which depends on something, when that something disappears, so will the love.
However, a love which depends on nothing will last forever.” Unknown
Faith
Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways
acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight. Proverbs 3:5,6
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“But what is worship? – to do the will of God – that is worship. And what is the will of God? –
to do to my fellow man what I would have my fellow man to do to me – that is the will of God.”
Herman Melville, Moby Dick
“If you do not stand firm in your faith, you will not stand at all.” Isaiah 7:9
Come to me, all ye who travail and are heavy laden and I will refresh thee. Take my yoke and
put it on you, and learn from me, because I am gentle and humble in spirit; and you will find rest.
Matthew 11:28-29
“Many are the plans in a man's heart, but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails.” Proverbs 19:21
“Bear one another's burdens, and so you will fulfill the law of Christ.” Galatians 6:2
“But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press
on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ
Jesus.” Unknown
“I know men, and I tell you that Jesus Christ is not a man...Alexander, Caesar,
Charlemagne, and myself founded empires. But upon what did we rest the creation of our
genius? Upon force! Jesus Christ alone founded His empire upon love, and at this hour
millions of men would die for Him! What proof of the divinity of Christ! With an empire so
absolute, He has but one simple end, the spiritual melioration of individuals, the purity of
conscience, the union of that which is true, the holiness of the soul.” Napoleon Bonaparte
Seeking Jesus his depths I measured
A stone drops, no sound returns
Unspoken
"This was a moment made for worshiping because it is a moment I'm alive" Steven Curtis
Chapman
"The Bible was not given to increase our knowledge but to change our lives." D.L. Moody
"The glory of God is man fully alive." Saint Irenaeus
“I believe in Christianity as I believe that the Sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because
by it I see everything else.” C. S. Lewis
“Victory and defeat are in the hands of God. You must learn to love the struggle.” Anonymous
“I have been driven many times to my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere
else to go. My own wisdom, and that of all about me, seemed insufficient for the day.”
Abraham Lincoln
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Miscellaneous
“When you have tasted flight, you will always walk the earth with your eyes skyward; for there
you have been and there you will always be.” Leonardo DaVinci
For I have stared down death itself and sacrificed my body to the wind on the chance that flight
may for the first time bring me escape. Unknown
“It is a Tacit, yet profound admission of the pre-eminence of flying in the hierarchy of the human
spirit, that those who seek to control aviators via threats always threaten to take one's wings and
not one's life.” Unknown
If the good Lord had wanted man to stay on the ground, he would have given us roots. Unknown
“Got a grand piano to prop up my mortal remains.” Pink Floyd, The Wall Part II, “Nobody
Home”
“Man...is a tame or civilized animal; never the less, he requires proper instruction and a fortunate
nature, and then of all animals he becomes the most divine and most civilized; but if he be
insufficiently or ill-educated he is the most savage of earthly creatures.” Plato
“There are painters who transform the sun into a yellow spot, but there are others thanks to their
art and intelligence, who transform a yellow spot into the sun.” Pablo Picasso
Each night, when I go to sleep, I die. And the next morning, when I wake up, I am reborn."
Mahatma Gandhi
"People seem not to see that their opinion of the world is also a confession of their character."
Ralph Waldo Emerson
“have but one request to ask at my departure from this world — it is the charity of its silence!
Let no man write my epitaph: for as no man who knows my motives dare now vindicate them.
Let not prejudice or ignorance asperse them. Let them and me repose in obscurity and peace,
and my tomb remain uninscribed, until other times, and other men, can do justice to my
character; when my country takes her place among the nations of the earth, then, and not till
then, let my epitaph be written. I have done.” Robert Emmet
“Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And
when you look long into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you.” Nietzsche
"Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocre minds. The latter cannot
understand it when a person does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary prejudices but honestly
and courageously uses their intelligence." Albert Einstein
"There are no facts. Only interpretations" Nietzsche
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“Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.” Mother Teresa
“Be the change you want to see in the world.” Gandhi
“Neither fire nor wind, birth nor death can erase our good deeds.” Buddha
“He who finds a thought that enables him to obtain a slightly deeper glimpse into the eternal
secrets of nature has been given great grace.” Albert Einstein
“The creation of a thousand forests is in a single acorn.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
“It makes a great difference in the force of a sentence, whether a man be behind it or no.” Ralph
Waldo Emerson
“People may not remember what you said or did, but they will always remember how you made
them feel.” Unknown
“A single thread in a tapestry though its color brightly shines, cannot see its purpose in the
pattern of the grand design.” Unknown
“The only reward of virtue is virtue; the only way to have a friend is to be one.” Ralph Waldo
Emerson
“The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good.”
Samuel Johnson
“I may no longer depend on pleasant impulses to bring me before the Lord. I must rather respond
to principles I know to be right, whether I feel them to be enjoyable or not.” Jim Elliot
“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond
measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to
be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be?” Marianne
Williamson
“Everyone sees how you appear, few touch what you are.” Niccolo Machiavelli
“He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.” Jim Elliot
“By perseverance, study, and eternal desire, any man can become great.” George S. Patton Jr.
“There comes a time in every man's life when he is called upon to do something very special;
something for which he and only he has the capabilities, has the skills, and has the necessary
training. What a pity if the moment finds the man unprepared.” Winston Churchill
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“Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has
something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to
your brother; then come and offer your gift.” Matthew 5
“With Malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see
the right, let us strive on to finish the world we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds.”
Abraham Lincoln
“I would be willing to live in torture, die tomorrow, if for one day I could be truly great.”
General George S. Patton Jr.
“It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men
lived.” General George S. Patton Jr.
“Everything which the enemy least expects will succeed the best.” Frederick the Great
“There are but two powers in the world, the sword and the mind. In the long run the sword is
always beaten by the mind.” Napoleon Bonaparte
“Things do not change; we change.” Henry David Thoreau
“The world's great men have not commonly been great scholars, nor its great scholars great
men.” Oliver Wendell Holmes
“There comes a time for everybody when words and reasons can become such a great
weariness.” Sati
“The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.” Nelson
Henderson
“Justice will only be achieved when those who are not injured by crime feel as indignant as those
who are.” King Solomon
“The friend of my adversity I shall always cherish most. I can better trust those who helped to
relieve the gloom of my dark hours than those who are so ready to enjoy with me the sunshine of
my prosperity.” Ulysses S. Grant
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