The Laws of Nature are just, but terrible. There is no weak mercy in them. Cause and consequence are inseparable and inevitable. The elements have no forbearance. The fire burns, the water drowns, the air consumes, the earth buries. And perhaps it would be well for our race if the punishment of crimes against the Laws of Man were as inevitable as the punishment of crimes against the Laws of Nature — were Man as unerring in his judgments as Nature.
If we could read the secret history of our enemies, we should find in each man’s life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
“Table Talk,” Drift-Wood (1857)
(Source)
More discussion of this quotation here: If We Could Read the Secret History of Our Enemies, We Should Find in Each Man’s Life Sorrow and Suffering Enough To Disarm All Hostility – Quote Investigator.
Nature is a revelation of God; Art a revelation of man.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
(Attributed)
Believe me, every heart has its secret sorrow which the world knows not, and oftentimes we call a man cold, when he is only sad.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
Hyperion: A Romance, 3.4 (1839)
Trust no future, however pleasant!
Let the dead past bury its dead!
Act, — act in the living Present!
Heart within and God overhead.Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
(Attributed)
The grave is but a covered bridge leading from light to light, through a brief darkness.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) American poet
A Covered Bridge at Lucerne
Since everything in life is but an experience perfect in being what it is, having nothing to do with good or bad, acceptance or rejection, one may well burst out in laughter.
Long Chen Pa (fl. 14th C.) Tibetan Dzogchen master
(Attributed)
Don’t loaf and invite inspiration; light out after it with a club, and if you don’t get it you will nonetheless get something that looks remarkably like it.
Jack London (1876-1916) American novelist
“Getting into Print,” The Editor Magazine (1903)
Often misquoted as "You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club." Reprinted in J. Reeve, Practical Authorship (1905).
If you don’t play to win, why bother to keep score?
Adolph Rupp (1901-1977) American college basketball coach
Comment (11 Jun 1958)
Rupp frequently returned to this phrase, usually in response to someone quoting to him from Grantland Rice's "Alumnus Football" (paraphrased, "It doesn't matter whether you win or lose, but how you play the game").
Variations:
Rupp wasn't necessarily the originator of this thought. Clair Bee, another US college basketball coach, said during the CCNY Point Shaving Scandal that ended his career, "If the kids aren't playing for keeps, why keep score?" (20 Feb 1951).
- "If it doesn't matter who wins or loses, then what in the hell is that scoreboard doing up there?"
- "If it doesn't matter, then why does every school have a scoreboard? If it doesn't matter who wins why do 25,000 football fans follow a team 400 miles and sit in eight inches of snow to watch the game?" [Source]
- "If winning isn't so important, why do they keep score?" [Source]
Sometimes attributed to Vince Lombardi.
More discussion of this quotation: The Big Apple: “If winning isn’t important, why keep score?”
If you aren’t fired with enthusiasm, you will be fired with enthusiasm.
Vince Lombardi (1913-1970) American football coach
(Attributed)
It’s not whether you get knocked down, it’s whether you get up.
Vince Lombardi (1913-1970) American football coach
(Attributed)
The real glory is being knocked to your knees and then coming back. That’s real glory. That’s the essence of it.
Vince Lombardi (1913-1970) American football coach
(Attributed)
Winning isn’t everything, but wanting to win is.
Vince Lombardi (1913-1970) American football coach
(Attributed)
I never lost a football game. Once in a while time ran out.
Vince Lombardi (1913-1970) American football coach
(Attributed)
Possibly if a true estimate were made of the morality and religions of the world, we should find that the far greater part of mankind received even those opinions and ceremonies they would die for, rather from the fashions of their countries and the constant practice of those about them than from any conviction of their reasons.
John Locke (1632-1704) English philosopher
“On Education”
The only fence against the world is a thorough knowledge of it.
John Locke (1632-1704) English philosopher
(1693)
There is no greater mistake than to try to leap an abyss in two jumps.
David Lloyd George (1863-1945) Welsh politician, statesman, UK Prime Minister (1916-22)
War Memoirs of David Lloyd George, Vol. 2, ch. 24 (1933)
Not original with Lloyd George, but usually attributed to him. For more information, see here. Variants:
- "Don’t be afraid to take a big step. You can’t cross a chasm in two small jumps."
- "The most dangerous thing in the world is to leap a chasm in two jumps."
- "Anything can be achieved in small, deliberate steps. But there are times you need the courage to take a great leap; you can't cross a chasm in two small jumps."
- "There is nothing more dangerous than to leap a chasm in two jumps."
People these days are reluctant to read the canonical texts, but they love fiction. Not all fiction, mind you, for they are sick of exemplary themes and far prefer the obscene and fantastic. How low contemporary morals have sunk! Anyone concerned about public morality will want to retrieve the situation.”
Li Yu (1610-1680) Chinese playwright, novelist, publisher
The Carnal Prayer Mat (c. AD 1657)
We can endure neither our evils nor their cures.
Livy (59 BC-AD 17) Roman historian [Titus Livius]
(Attributed)
In difficult situations when hope seems feeble, the boldest plans are the safest.
Livy (59 BC-AD 17) Roman historian [Titus Livius]
(Attributed)
Truth is often eclipsed but never extinguished.
Livy (59 BC-AD 17) Roman historian [Titus Livius]
(Attributed)
There is no pleasure in having nothing to do; the fun is in having lots to do and not doing it.
Mary Wilson Little (fl. c. 1905) American writer
(Attributed)
Let’s never forget that we ALL have aspects about us which could cause us to find ourselves on the sharp-edged side of the razorwired fence should the winds of mass hysteria, whipped up from public opinion by demagogues, shift.
(Other Authors and Sources)
Bruce Little, Belief-L
Corrupt, stupid grasping functionaries will make at least as big a muddle of socialism as stupid, selfish and acquisitive employers can make of capitalism.
Walter Lippmann (1889-1974) American journalist and author
(Attributed)
Many a time I have wanted to stop talking and find out what I really believed.
Walter Lippmann (1889-1974) American journalist and author
Observer (27 Mar. 1938)
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 (1889-1974) American journalist and author
“Roosevelt Has Gone,” “Today and Tomorrow” column (14 Apr 1945)
On the death of Franklin Roosevelt.
He has honor if he holds himself to an ideal of conduct though it is inconvenient, unprofitable, or dangerous to do so.
Walter Lippmann (1889-1974) American journalist and author
A Preface to Morals, 11.3 (1929)
When all think alike, no one thinks very much.
Walter Lippmann (1889-1974) American journalist and author
(Attributed)
It takes as much courage to have tried and failed as it does to have tried and succeeded.
Anne Morrow Lindbergh (1906-2001) American writer, pilot
(Attributed)
Good communication is stimulating as black coffee, and just as hard to sleep after.
Anne Morrow Lindbergh (1906-2001) American writer, pilot
Gift From the Sea, ch. 6 “Argonauta” (1955)
(Source)
Often misquoted as "is as stimulating" or "is just as stimulating as."
The most exhausting thing in life, I have discovered, is being insincere..
Anne Morrow Lindbergh (1906-2001) American writer, pilot
Gifts from the Sea (1955)
I am convinced, the longer I live, that life & its blessings are not so entirely unjustly distributed [as] when we are suffering greatly, we are inclined to suppose.
Mary Todd Lincoln (1818-1882) American First Lady
Letter to Mrs. Slataper (29 Sep. 1868)
My evil genius Procrastination has whispered me to tarry ’til a more convenient season.
Mary Todd Lincoln (1818-1882) American First Lady
Letter (Jun. 1841)
The best thing about the future is that it only comes one day at a time.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
Tact is the ability to describe others as they see themselves.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
I care not for a man’s religion whose dog or cat are not the better for it.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
Frequently attributed to Lincoln without citation, it's actually a variant of "I would give nothing for that man's religion, whose very dog and cat are not the better for it," by Rowland Hill (1744-1833), an English preacher, attributed in George Seaton Bowes, Illustrative Gatherings, or, Preachers and Teachers (1860). Lincoln may have used the line.
I am not at all concerned about that, for I know that the Lord is always on the side of the right; but, it is my constant anxiety and prayer that I, and this nation, should be on the Lord’s side.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed) (1862)
Reply to a clergyman who said he hoped the Lord was on our side. In Francis B. Carpenter, Six Months at the White House with Abraham Lincoln, p. 282 (1867). In some places cited as 1864.
Most of us are just about as happy as we make up our minds to be.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Spurious)
Not found any earlier than in casual attribution in 1914. More info here.
I desire to conduct the affairs of this administration that if at the end, when I come to lay down the reins of power, I have lost every other friend on earth, I shall at least have one friend left, and that friend shall be down inside of me.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
Reply to the Missouri Committee of Seventy (30 Sep 1864)
Gentlemen, why don’t you laugh? With the fearful strain that is upon me night and day, if I did not laugh, I should die.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
If I were two-faced, would I be wearing this one?
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
When I do good, I feel good. When I do bad, I feel bad. That’s my religion.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
Recalled by Lincoln from an Indiana church meeting talk by "an old man named Glenn" in the 1810s.
I have simply tried to do what seemed best each day, as each day came.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
Our progress in degeneracy appears to me to be pretty rapid. As a nation we began by declaring that “all men are created equal.” We now practically read it “all men are created equal, except Negroes.” When the Know-Nothings get control, it will read “all men are created equal, except Negroes and foreigners and Catholics.” When it comes to this, I shall prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretence of loving liberty — to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocrisy.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
Letter to Joshua Speed (1855-08-24)
(Source)
Whenever I hear anyone arguing for slavery, I feel a strong impulse to see it tried on him personally.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
Speech to 140th Indiana regiment (17 Mar 1865)
He can compress the most words into the smallest ideas of any man I ever met.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
Quoted in Frederick Trevor Hill, Lincoln the Lawyer, ch. 19 (1906). Hill adds, "History has considerately sheltered the identity of the victim."
The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep’s throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as his liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act as the destroyer of liberty.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
People who like this sort of thing will find this the sort of thing they like.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
One of the earliest references to something like this was in an 1863 newspaper ad for Lincoln’s favorite humorist, Artemus Ward, that included this faux testimonial (possibly written by Ward): “I have never heard any of your lectures, but from what I can learn I should say that for people who like the kind of lectures you deliver, they are just the kind of lectures such people like. Yours respectfully, O. Abe.”
Quoted in G.W.E. Russell, Collections and Recollections, ch. 30 (1898), regarding “an unreadably sentimental book.”
According to Anthony Gross, Lincoln’s Own Stories (1902), Lincoln’s was speaking to Robert Dale Owen, who had insisted on reading to Lincoln a long manuscript on spiritualism. "Well, for those who like that sort of thing, I should think it is just about the sort of thing they would like."
In Emanual Hertz, ed., "Father Abraham," Lincoln Talks: A Biography in Anecdote (1939), the response was to a young poet asking him about his newly published poems.
More discussion of this quotation: Ralph Keyes, The Quote Verifier.
It has been my experience that folks who have no vices have very few virtues.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
Quoted in F B Carpenter, The Inner Life of Abraham Lincoln (1867); Lincoln repeated this as told to him by a fellow-passenger in a stagecoach.
I don’t know who my grandfather was; I’m much more concerned to know what his grandson will be.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
You cannot escape the responsibility tomorrow by evading it today.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
I do the very best I know how — the very best I can; and I mean to keep doing so until the end. If the end brings me out all right, what is said against me won’t amount to anything. If the end brings me out wrong, ten angels swearing I was right would make no difference.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
In Francis Carpenter, Six Months at the White House, ch. 68 (1866)
My great concern is not whether you have failed, but whether you are content with your failure.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
(Attributed)
As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy. Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference, is no democracy.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
“On Slavery and Democracy” (fragment) (1858?)