My authoritarian and quick manner of making decisions led me to have serious problems and to be accused of being ultraconservative. I have never been a right-winger. It was my authoritarian way of making decisions that created problems.

It has not yet become obvious to me that there’s no real problem. I cannot define the real problem; therefore, I suspect there’s no real problem, but I’m not sure there’s no real problem.

The men who have guided the destiny of the United States have found the strength for their tasks by going to their knees. This private unity of public men and their God is an enduring source of reassurance for the people of America.

The high destiny of the individual is to serve rather than to rule.

The last thing I wanted to do was to be a wartime President.

In George Bush you get experience, and with me you get – The Future!

A president has an inescapable responsibility to provide direction: What are we trying to achieve? What are we trying to prevent? Why? To do that, he has to both analyze and reflect.

To compromise simply means that you go a tiny bit below what you know is right.

I just think you ought to talk straight with your people.

It is better to lead from behind and to put others in front, especially when you celebrate victory when nice things occur. You take the front line when there is danger. Then people will appreciate your leadership.

I don’t spend my time pontificating about high-concept things; I spend my time solving engineering and manufacturing problems.

As soon as questions of will or decision or reason or choice of action arise, human science is at a loss.

The time comes upon every public man when it is best for him to keep his lips closed.

When you’re around the kids, you feel like you act the most grown up just because you’re supposed to lead. I say things, like every other parent, that reminds you of your own parents. One thing I do know about being a parent, you understand why your father was in a bad mood a lot.

I’ve never gone wrong trusting my gut.

Every sentence spoken by Napoleon, and every line of his writing, deserves reading, as it is the sense of France.

Young people are fitter to invent than to judge; fitter for execution than for counsel; and more fit for new projects than for settled business.

Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.

My favourite president, and the one I admired most, was Harry Truman.

I was not a messiah, but an ordinary man who had become a leader because of extraordinary circumstances.

I vividly remember a conversation I had many years ago in 1974, which marked a turning point in my leadership journey. I was sitting at a Holiday Inn with my friend, Kurt Campmeyer, when he asked me if I had a personal growth plan. I didn’t. In fact, I didn’t even know you were supposed to have one.

My message, especially to young people is to have courage to think differently, courage to invent, to travel the unexplored path, courage to discover the impossible and to conquer the problems and succeed. These are great qualities that they must work towards. This is my message to the young people.

The people of the world genuinely want peace. Some day the leaders of the world are going to have to give in and give it to them.

A general is just as good or just as bad as the troops under his command make him.

When there is a lack of honor in government, the morals of the whole people are poisoned.

Locally, I’ll vote one way and nationally, maybe another.

For success of any mission, it is necessary to have creative leadership. Creative leadership is vital for government, non-governmental organisations as well as for industries.

With Malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds.

The people will save their government, if the government itself will allow them.

I consider the fact that thousands of children die each day from starvation and a lack of medicine a crisis for humanity and a problem we must collectively attempt to solve.

Remember that the essence of authority is that people willingly follow your lead.

If I made a commitment, I stood by that commitment – and try to make it real. Because when you become leaders, the most important thing you have is your word, your trust. That’s where respect comes from.

It is change, continuing change, inevitable change, that is the dominant factor in society today. No sensible decision can be made any longer without taking into account not only the world as it is, but the world as it will be.

I want a president who will teach our children that everyone in this country matters, a president who truly believes in the vision that our Founders put forth all those years ago that we are all created equal, each a beloved part of the great American story.

I don’t think consensus-building politics is what I’m meant to be doing.

Blessed are the people whose leaders can look destiny in the eye without flinching but also without attempting to play God.

It is a well-known fact that those people who must want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it… anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job.

As President Nixon says, presidents can do almost anything, and President Nixon has done many things that nobody would have thought of doing.

I have made good judgments in the past. I have made good judgments in the future.

If an idea isn’t exciting, you shouldn’t do it.

I’m the only president you’ve got.

Don’t blame the marketing department. The buck stops with the chief executive.

It’s one of the few regrets of my presidency – that the rancor and suspicion between the parties has gotten worse instead of better. There’s no doubt a president with the gifts of Lincoln or Roosevelt might have better bridged the divide, and I guarantee I’ll keep trying to be better so long as I hold this office.

I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.

I just figured out that if I gave my all into this game – if I put everything into the fight business – then I would eventually run the fight business.

I think that somehow, we learn who we really are and then live with that decision.

People who add value to others do so intentionally. I say that because to add value, leaders must give of themselves, and that rarely occurs by accident.

A man can’t be too careful in the choice of his enemies.

Chavez, who came out of the ranks of the Venezuelan Army, is methodical and tireless. I have observed him over the course of 17 years, since his first visit to Cuba. He is an extremely humanitarian and law-abiding person; he has never taken revenge on anybody.

Dictators free themselves, but they enslave the people.

Our chief justices have probably had more profound and lasting influence on their times and on the direction of the nation than most presidents.

If you’re going to do something tonight that you’ll be sorry for tomorrow morning, sleep late.

The safest course is to do nothing against one’s conscience. With this secret, we can enjoy life and have no fear from death.

A President’s hardest task is not to do what is right, but to know what is right.

A good model of how to ‚work with the enemy‘ internally is presented by the Dalai Lama, in his endless caretaking of his soul as he confronts the Chinese government that invaded Tibet.

Probably the battle of Waterloo was won on the playing-fields of Eton, but the opening battles of all subsequent wars have been lost there.

Military school was great and especially great for leadership and then I spent two years in Vietnam.

Any woman who understands the problems of running a home will be nearer to understanding the problems of running a country.

‚Tis one thing to be tempted, another thing to fall.

You know I vowed when I became President not to talk about the loneliest toughest job in the world and I didn’t.

Never get married in college; it’s hard to get a start if a prospective employer finds you’ve already made one mistake.