I’ve had the good fortune and blessing to run for the offices for which I really wanted to do the work.

You have to stay faithful to what you’re working on.

At least the Pilgrim Fathers used to shoot Indians: the Pilgrim Children merely punch time clocks.

Pride is still aiming at the best houses: Men would be angels, angels would be gods. Aspiring to be gods, if angels fell; aspiring to be angels men rebel.

Those who cannot work with their hearts achieve but a hollow, half-hearted success that breeds bitterness all around.

An early-morning walk is a blessing for the whole day.

Some day I shall be President.

If you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work.

What? You seek something? You wish to multiply yourself tenfold, a hundredfold? You seek followers? Seek zeros!

You can always amend a big plan, but you can never expand a little one. I don’t believe in little plans. I believe in plans big enough to meet a situation which we can’t possibly foresee now.

The true artist is not proud: he unfortunately sees that art has no limits; he feels darkly how far he is from the goal, and though he may be admired by others, he is sad not to have reached that point to which his better genius only appears as a distant, guiding sun.

All travel has its advantages. If the passenger visits better countries, he may learn to improve his own. And if fortune carries him to worse, he may learn to enjoy it.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the ambition of the great painters was to make paintings that were like music, which was then considered as the noblest art.

I identify myself as a hustler since I was a young kid.

Ambition should be made of sterner stuff.

Luck is not chance, it’s toil; fortune’s expensive smile is earned.

I like to have fun all the time, even if I’m working.

When Thomas Edison worked late into the night on the electric light, he had to do it by gas lamp or candle. I’m sure it made the work seem that much more urgent.

I’ve got a great ambition to die of exhaustion rather than boredom.

I’m hopeful. I know there is a lot of ambition in Washington, obviously. But I hope the ambitious realize that they are more likely to succeed with success as opposed to failure.

If you work hard and play by the rules, this country is truly open to you. You can achieve anything.

I would put our legislative and foreign policy accomplishments in our first two years against any president – with the possible exceptions of Johnson, FDR, and Lincoln – just in terms of what we’ve gotten done in modern history. But, you know, but when it comes to the economy, we’ve got a lot more work to do. And we’re gonna keep on at it.

In terms of doing work and in terms of learning and evolving as a person, you just grow more when you get more people’s perspectives… I really try and live the mission of the company and… keep everything else in my life extremely simple.

No one has a greater asset for his business than a man’s pride in his work.

I think members of the legislature, people who have to run for office, know the connection between money and influence on what laws get passed.

One can never consent to creep when one feels an impulse to soar.

I would say the most satisfying thing actually is watching my three children each pick up on their own interests and work many more hours per week than most people that have jobs at trying to intelligently give away that money in fields that they particularly care about.

I am certainly not one of those who need to be prodded. In fact, if anything, I am the prod.

People say ‚I want to be rich‘. The question is, ‚Are you willing to do what it takes?‘

I loved what I did. I could’ve been secretary of state for ever.

Whenever a man has cast a longing eye on offices, a rottenness begins in his conduct.

I didn’t know what a stockbroker was when I was eight, but I would just tell everybody that’s what I was going to be.

Fame and power are the objects of all men. Even their partial fruition is gained by very few; and that, too, at the expense of social pleasure, health, conscience, life.

The humanists‘ replacement for religion: work really hard and somehow you’ll either save yourself or you’ll be immortal. Of course, that’s a total joke, and our progress is nothing. There may be progress in technology but there’s no ethical progress whatsoever.

To have done anything just for money is to have been truly idle.

Basically you have to suppress your own ambitions in order to be who you need to be.

The average person puts only 25% of his energy and ability into his work. The world takes off its hat to those who put in more than 50% of their capacity, and stands on its head for those few and far between souls who devote 100%.

Dream in a pragmatic way.

It has always been my belief that a man should do his best, regardless of how much he receives for his services, or the number of people he may be serving or the class of people served.

I have a personal ambition to live my life honestly and honor the true love that I’ve had and also the people I’ve had around me.

Ambition is the immoderate desire for power.

The average Hollywood film star’s ambition is to be admired by an American, courted by an Italian, married to an Englishman and have a French boyfriend.

My work is the only ground I’ve ever had to stand on. To put it bluntly, I seem to have a whole superstructure with no foundation, but I’m working on the foundation.

He that humbleth himself wishes to be exalted.

When I grow up, I want to be like Balvin.

Asking is the beginning of receiving. Make sure you don’t go to the ocean with a teaspoon. At least take a bucket so the kids won’t laugh at you.

The biggest crime in England is to rise above your station. It’s fine to be a pop star. ‚Oh, it’s great, lots of fun, aren’t they sweet, these pop stars! But to think you have anything to say about how the world should work? What arrogance!‘

When small men attempt great enterprises, they always end by reducing them to the level of their mediocrity.

Some people feel that the world owes them a living.

I always had a repulsive need to be something more than human.

Get place and wealth, if possible with grace; if not, by any means get wealth and place.

Ambition is pitiless. Any merit that it cannot use it finds despicable.

A man’s worth is no greater than his ambitions.

A great fortune is a great slavery.

When you focus on being a blessing, God makes sure that you are always blessed in abundance.

I knew I was a winner back in the late sixties. I knew I was destined for great things. People will say that kind of thinking is totally immodest. I agree. Modesty is not a word that applies to me in any way – I hope it never will.

Are you bored with life? Then throw yourself into some work you believe in with all your heart, live for it, die for it, and you will find happiness that you had thought could never be yours.

I think Americans generally are not used to working very hard, in terms of working for the collective. I think in our country we have taken individualism to its farthest reaches, possibly.

For a true writer, each book should be a new beginning where he tries again for something that is beyond attainment. He should always try for something that has never been done or that others have tried and failed. Then sometimes, with great luck, he will succeed.

Diligence is the mother of good fortune.

You can live within the institutions and work hard to change them.