The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew and act anew.
A small body of determined spirits fired by an unquenchable faith in their mission can alter the course of history.
The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much it is whether we provide enough for those who have little.
Study history, study history. In history lies all the secrets of statecraft.
If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.
To wear your heart on your sleeve isn't a very good plan you should wear it inside, where it functions best.
History is a relentless master. It has no present, only the past rushing into the future. To try to hold fast is to be swept aside.
If we cannot now end our differences, at least we can help make the world safe for diversity.
Democratic nations must try to find ways to starve the terrorist and the hijacker of the oxygen of publicity on which they depend.
Observe good faith and justice toward all nations. Cultivate peace and harmony with all.
France, and the whole of Europe have a great culture and an amazing history. Most important thing though is that people there know how to live! In America they've forgotten all about it. I'm afraid that the American culture is a disaster.
The world we see that seems so insane is the result of a belief system that is not working. To perceive the world differently, we must be willing to change our belief system, let the past slip away, expand our sense of now, and dissolve the fear in our minds.
A world without nuclear weapons would be less stable and more dangerous for all of us.
When you do the common things in life in an uncommon way, you will command the attention of the world.
That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons of history.
The whole course of human history may depend on a change of heart in one solitary and even humble individual - for it is in the solitary mind and soul of the individual that the battle between good and evil is waged and ultimately won or lost.
History is an account, mostly false, of events, mostly unimportant, which are brought about by rulers, mostly knaves, and soldiers, mostly fools.
Posterity: you will never know how much it has cost my generation to preserve your freedom. I hope you will make good use of it.
History is the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon.
If one morning I walked on top of the water across the Potomac River, the headline that afternoon would read: 'President Can't Swim.'
History is a gallery of pictures in which there are few originals and many copies.
The Marine Corps is the Navy's police force and as long as I am President that is what it will remain. They have a propaganda machine that is almost equal to Stalin's.
Hubert Humphrey talks so fast that listening to him is like trying to read Playboy magazine with your wife turning the pages.
The chief condition on which, life, health and vigor depend on, is action. It is by action that an organism develops its faculties, increases its energy, and attains the fulfillment of its destiny.
Beware of endeavoring to become a great man in a hurry. One such attempt in ten thousand may succeed. These are fearful odds.
Being president is like being a jackass in a hailstorm. There's nothing to do but to stand there and take it.
We used to root for the Indians against the cavalry, because we didn't think it was fair in the history books that when the cavalry won it was a great victory, and when the Indians won it was a massacre.
The most terrible job in warfare is to be a second lieutenant leading a platoon when you are on the battlefield.
Why should we honour those that die upon the field of battle? A man may show as reckless a courage in entering into the abyss of himself.
They died hard, those savage men - like wounded wolves at bay. They were filthy, and they were lousy, and they stunk. And I loved them.