Every experiment, by multitudes or by individuals, that has a sensual and selfish aim, will fail.

The difference between us and them, between you and success, is not that you never fail, but it’s how you recover from those failures – is that you keep getting up time and time again. You figure out what you did wrong, and then you make it right. I say that to my kids every day.

Failure is not a single, cataclysmic event. You don’t fail overnight. Instead, failure is a few errors in judgement, repeated every day.

The topic of leadership is a touchy one. A lot of leaders fail because they don’t have the bravery to touch that nerve or strike that chord. Throughout my years, I haven’t had that fear.

Many a man’s strength is in opposition, and when he faileth, he grows out of use.

It’s not an experiment if you know it’s going to work.

The Vietnam War required us to emphasize the national interest rather than abstract principles. What President Nixon and I tried to do was unnatural. And that is why we didn’t make it.

Leadership is solving problems. The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help or concluded you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership.

Why do I talk about the benefits of failure? Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me.

I’ve had a lot of success; I’ve had failures, so I learn from the failure.

The world is like a grand staircase, some are going up and some are going down.

Success and failure are equally disastrous.

Both free speech rights and property rights belong legally to individuals, but their real function is social, to benefit vast numbers of people who do not themselves exercise these rights.

I thank God for my failures. Maybe not at the time but after some reflection. I never feel like a failure just because something I tried has failed.

Well, I screwed it up real good, didn’t I?

It doesn’t matter how beautiful your theory is, it doesn’t matter how smart you are. If it doesn’t agree with experiment, it’s wrong.

The probability that we may fail in the struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a cause we believe to be just.

I don’t think that you can invent on behalf of customers unless you’re willing to think long-term, because a lot of invention doesn’t work. If you’re going to invent, it means you’re going to experiment, and if you’re going to experiment, you’re going to fail, and if you’re going to fail, you have to think long term.

Don’t be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment.

No man ever achieved worth-while success who did not, at one time or other, find himself with at least one foot hanging well over the brink of failure.

Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.

The man who has won millions at the cost of his conscience is a failure.

Excess generally causes reaction, and produces a change in the opposite direction, whether it be in the seasons, or in individuals, or in governments.

There is no innovation and creativity without failure. Period.

Mankind, the spirit of the earth, the synthesis of individuals and peoples, the paradoxical conciliation of the element with the whole, and of unity with multitude – all these are called Utopian, and yet they are biologically necessary.

Every adversity, every failure, every heartache carries with it the seed of an equal or greater benefit.

There will be no lasting peace either in the heart of individuals or in social customs until death is outlawed.

One’s only rival is one’s own potentialities. One’s only failure is failing to live up to one’s own possibilities. In this sense, every man can be a king, and must therefore be treated like a king.

Egos are never nice. I have been a victim of it a lot of times in my career. Whenever I have used it, I have failed.

Those who dare to fail miserably can achieve greatly.

Nobody likes to fail. I want to succeed in everything I do, which isn’t much. But the things that I’m really passionate about, if I fail at those, if I’m not successful, what do I have?

I firmly believe that unless one has tasted the bitter pill of failure, one cannot aspire enough for success.

The theory seems to be that as long as a man is a failure he is one of God’s children, but that as soon as he succeeds he is taken over by the Devil.

Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising up every time we fail.

Ambition is the last refuge of the failure.

A failure is a man who has blundered, but is not able to cash in the experience.

Well, I think that there’s a very thin dividing line between success and failure. And I think if you start a business without financial backing, you’re likely to go the wrong side of that dividing line.

The situation in the sciences is this: A concept or an idea which cannot be measured or cannot be referred directly to experiment may or may not be useful. It need not exist in a theory.

When we tackle obstacles, we find hidden reserves of courage and resilience we did not know we had. And it is only when we are faced with failure do we realise that these resources were always there within us. We only need to find them and move on with our lives.

Far better is it to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure… than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much, because they live in a gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat.

Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable… Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals.

People in their handlings of affairs often fail when they are about to succeed. If one remains as careful at the end as he was at the beginning, there will be no failure.

That our government should have been maintained in its original form from its establishment until now is not much to be wondered at. It had many props to support it through that period, which now are decayed and crumbled away. Through that period, it was felt by all to be an undecided experiment; now, it is understood to be a successful one.

If you read enough biography and history, you learn how people have dealt successfully or unsuccessfully with similar situations or patterns in the past. It doesn’t give you a template of answers, but it does help you refine the questions you have to ask yourself.

A passionate belief in your business and personal objectives can make all the difference between success and failure. If you aren’t proud of what you’re doing, why should anybody else be?

Success is due to our stretching to the challenges of life. Failure comes when we shrink from them.

Your attitude towards failure determines your altitude after failure.

One of the most basic factors in sports is that winning becomes a habit, and losing is the same way. When failure starts to feel normal in your life or your work or even your darkest vices, you won’t have to go looking for trouble, because trouble will find you. Count on it.

It’s fine to celebrate success but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure.

Music is the mediator between the spiritual and the sensual life.

By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.

When a coil is operated with currents of very high frequency, beautiful brush effects may be produced, even if the coil be of comparatively small dimensions. The experimenter may vary them in many ways, and, if it were nothing else, they afford a pleasing sight.

Socialism in general has a record of failure so blatant that only an intellectual could ignore or evade it.

The thing I always say to people is this: ‚If you avoid failure, you also avoid success.‘

Success is the result of perfection, hard work, learning from failure, loyalty, and persistence.

Many a man fails as an original thinker simply because his memory it too good.

The biggest risk is not taking any risk… In a world that is changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.

I put instant coffee in a microwave oven and almost went back in time.

Think twice before you speak, because your words and influence will plant the seed of either success or failure in the mind of another.

Success or failure depends more upon attitude than upon capacity successful men act as though they have accomplished or are enjoying something. Soon it becomes a reality. Act, look, feel successful, conduct yourself accordingly, and you will be amazed at the positive results.

If you or I fail at business, we fail. If we cheat and fail, we go to jail. But if you’re rich and politically connected, your incompetence may be protected by a government bailout.