History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again.

History should be written as philosophy.

Adopt responsibility for your own well-being, try to put your family together, try to serve your community, try to seek for eternal truth… That’s the sort of thing that can ground you in your life, enough so that you can withstand the difficulty of life.

If you try to fight the course, it will beat you.

Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.

Real nobility is based on scorn, courage, and profound indifference.

I’ll never tell a lie. I’ll never make a misleading statement. I’ll never betray the confidence that any of you had in me. And I’ll never avoid a controversial issue.

The most courageous act is still to think for yourself. Aloud.

I would storm the gates of Hell if Third Marine Air Wing was overhead.

Never let yesterday use up too much of today.

If history repeats itself, and the unexpected always happens, how incapable must Man be of learning from experience.

I don’t think we handled the aftermath of the fall of Baghdad as well as we might have. But that’s now history.

Early on in my life, I had a broken soul. I was abused by my father, abandoned by my mother and ended up in a destructive first marriage. By the time I was 23, I was broken in my soul. I didn’t know how to think right. I felt wrong about everything. But God stepped into my life, and I came out on the other side and didn’t even smell like smoke.

I’m on record that it didn’t really traumatize me to do away with some people.

I’ve had two cancer bouts in my years on the Court, and the first one, Justice O’Connor told me, ‚Now, you do the chemotherapy on Friday because you’ll get over it during the weekend and you can be back in court on Monday.‘

No great man lives in vain. The history of the world is but the biography of great men.

Courage is grace under pressure.

It is rather for us here dedicated to the great task remaining before us, that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion.

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

Those who weep for the happy periods which they encounter in history acknowledge what they want; not the alleviation but the silencing of misery.

Man is not made for defeat.

Do the thing we fear, and death of fear is certain.

He that wrestles with us strengthens our nerves and sharpens our skill. Our antagonist is our helper.

Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of readiness to die.

The solutions to our problems are and always will be based upon universal, timeless, self-evident principles common to every enduring, prospering society throughout history.

I can’t jump the highest. I’m obviously not the biggest, not the strongest.

You need a certain amount of nerve to be a writer.

Lets have faith that right makes might; and in that faith let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it.

I had nearly finished school because I was making effort not that bad on that. But there was a law in Germany after the war. You could not make your final examination before 18, so lots of people who were late because of the way had to do it first.

Even after a bad harvest there must be sowing.

The facts tell us that no religious Faith releases – or ever has released at any moment in History – a higher degree of warmth, a more intense dynamism of unification than the Christianity of our own day – and the more Catholic it is, the truer my words.

If man makes himself a worm he must not complain when he is trodden on.

I began revolution with 82 men. If I had to do it again, I do it with 10 or 15 and absolute faith. It does not matter how small you are if you have faith and plan of action.

When you’re in hell, you forget how great you really are because you’re suffering and you forget the great things you’ve done.

I am sure there’s going to be times when I do things wrong that no one’s going to like and everyone’s going to think I’m terrible and rubbish but I know I’m going to go through those times, and it’s just about understanding that that’s going to happen.

The view of Jerusalem is the history of the world; it is more, it is the history of earth and of heaven.

Blood alone moves the wheels of history.

Finite to fail, but infinite to venture.

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

While the crash only took place six months ago, I am convinced we have now passed the worst, and with continued unity of effort, we shall rapidly recover. There is one certainty of the future of a people of the resources, intelligence and character of the people of the United States – that is, prosperity.

It’s not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters.

The successful man will profit from his mistakes and try again in a different way.

You sort of start thinking anything’s possible if you’ve got enough nerve.

In other words, don’t expect to always be great. Disappointments, failures and setbacks are a normal part of the lifecycle of a unit or a company and what the leader has to do is constantly be up and say ‚we have a problem, let’s go and get it‘.

Terrorist attacks can shake the foundations of our biggest buildings, but they cannot touch the foundation of America. These acts shatter steel, but they cannot dent the steel of American resolve.

It is only through labor and painful effort, by grim energy and resolute courage, that we move on to better things.

Predicting rain doesn’t count. Building arks does.

If we take the generally accepted definition of bravery as a quality which knows no fear, I have never seen a brave man. All men are frightened. The more intelligent they are, the more they are frightened.

What we need to do is always lean into the future; when the world changes around you and when it changes against you – what used to be a tail wind is now a head wind – you have to lean into that and figure out what to do because complaining isn’t a strategy.

I happen to be a big fan of Western civilization; I think it beats the hell out of tyranny and starvation.

Just try new things. Don’t be afraid. Step out of your comfort zones and soar, all right?

Only if you have been in the deepest valley, can you ever know how magnificent it is to be on the highest mountain.

Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.

Courage is a mean with regard to fear and confidence.

Never confuse a single defeat with a final defeat.

I tend not to look back and dwell on a project once it is finished.

Before success comes in any man’s life, he’s sure to meet with much temporary defeat and, perhaps some failures. When defeat overtakes a man, the easiest and the most logical thing to do is to quit. That’s exactly what the majority of men do.

All the adversity I’ve had in my life, all my troubles and obstacles, have strengthened me… You may not realize it when it happens, but a kick in the teeth may be the best thing in the world for you.

Just as we develop our physical muscles through overcoming opposition – such as lifting weights – we develop our character muscles by overcoming challenges and adversity.

I’m not looking for sympathy at all.

Freedom is what you do with what’s been done to you.