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

I don’t think I would run for president.

You know, you can only lead them from behind.

The onus is on the managers to send out an attacking formation and to tell their players to be bold.

War should be the only study of a prince. He should consider peace only as a breathing-time, which gives him leisure to contrive, and furnishes as ability to execute, military plans.

Anything important is never left to the vote of the people. We only get to vote on some man; we never get to vote on what he is to do.

Mind you, the Elizabethans had so many words for the female genitals that it is quite hard to speak a sentence of modern English without inadvertently mentioning at least three of them.

The only justification for repressive institutions is material and cultural deficit. But such institutions, at certain stages of history, perpetuate and produce such a deficit, and even threaten human survival.

I’m responsible for starting a whole new school of pretension.

Never forget that everything Hitler did in Germany was legal.

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

As our enemies have found we can reason like men, so now let us show them we can fight like men also.

If once you forfeit the confidence of your fellow-citizens, you can never regain their respect and esteem.

Power is the great aphrodisiac.

If anyone thinks they’d rather be in a different part of history, they’re probably not a very good student of history. Life sucked in the old days. People knew very little, and you were likely to die at a young age of some horrible disease. You’d probably have no teeth by now. It would be particularly awful if you were a woman.

Skepticism is a virtue in history as well as in philosophy.

The most practical kind of politics is the politics of decency.

I felt we must separate political responsibility. The Dalai Lama should not carry that burden. So that is my selfish reason – to protect the old Dalai Lama tradition. It is safer without political involvement.

When the tyrant has disposed of foreign enemies by conquest or treaty, and there is nothing more to fear from them, then he is always stirring up some war or other, in order that the people may require a leader.

You can tell the tree by the fruit it bears. You see it through what the organization is delivering as far as a concrete program. If the tree’s fruit sours or grows brackish, then the time has come to chop it down – bury it and walk over it and plant new seeds.

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

When you get to be President, there are all those things, the honors, the twenty-one gun salutes, all those things. You have to remember it isn’t for you. It’s for the Presidency.

The strength of a nation derives from the integrity of the home.

Men are what their mothers made them.

Whether slavery shall go into Nebraska, or other new territories, is not a matter of exclusive concern to the people who may go there. The whole nation is interested that the best use shall be made of these territories. We want them for the homes of free white people.

If we have to use force, it is because we are America. We are the indispensable nation. We stand tall. We see further into the future.

I know from having had a child, and from having been a child myself, that children will copy you.

The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.

Science is the captain, and practice the soldiers.

The more nobly a man wills and acts, the more avid he becomes for great and sublime aims to pursue. He will no longer be content with family, country, and the remunerative aspect of his work. He will want wider organisations to create, new paths to blaze, causes to uphold, truths to discover, an ideal to cherish and defend.

And I will do everything that I can as long as I am President of the United States to remind the American people that we are one nation under God, and we may call that God different names but we remain one nation.

All black Americans have slave names. They have white names; names that the slave master has given to them.

The task of the leader is to get his people from where they are to where they have not been.

History is the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon.

Most people don’t like change. They revolt against it unless they can clearly see the advantage it brings. For that reason, when good leaders prepare to take action or make changes, they take people through a process to get them ready for it.

If you tell people where to go, but not how to get there, you’ll be amazed at the results.

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.

The best executive is one who has sense enough to pick good people to do what he wants done, and self-restraint enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it.

The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted.

Work is of two kinds: first, altering the position of matter at or near the earth’s surface relative to other matter; second, telling other people to do so.

The more you are talked about the less powerful you are.

Unless and until you inspire the people, you will not get results. Imposition will never give you the results. Inspiration will always give you the results.

It is our future on the line, and we must at least have a say in it.

Actually, to be an effective person politically in this country, I think you have to be thirty or over, and also you have to be rich, well-placed, you have to be close to power. And I don’t think that young people, because they look young, can do much, as I think they are counterproductive.

From their experience or from the recorded experience of others (history), men learn only what their passions and their metaphysical prejudices allow them to learn.

The most important thing for a director is being able to communicate.

In history people dressed much better than we do today.

Governing a great nation is like cooking a small fish – too much handling will spoil it.

On every front there are clear answers out there that can make this country stronger, but we’re going to break through the fear and the frustration people are feeling. Our job is to make sure that even as we make progress, that we are also giving people a sense of hope and vision for the future.

The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better. I, therefore, intend to oppose the effort to increase America’s debt.

If we ever forget that we are One Nation Under God, then we will be a nation gone under.

The philosophy of the school room in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next.

If I can be a leader, I will.

Our schools and colleges are turning out people who cannot feel fulfilled unless they are telling other people what to do.

I have never been a quitter. To leave office before my term is completed is opposed to every instinct in my body. But as president I must put the interests of America first Therefore, I shall resign the presidency effective at noon tomorrow.

To rule a country of a thousand chariots, there must be reverent attention to business, and sincerity; economy in expenditure, and love for men; and the employment of the people at the proper seasons.

As president, you can get all kinds of advice from all kinds of people. But at the end of the day, when it comes time to make that decision, as president, all you have to guide you are your values and your vision and the life experiences that make you who you are.

Until the men of action clear out the talkers we who have social consciences are at the mercy of those who have none.

Earn your success based on service to others, not at the expense of others.

Humans cannot avoid trying to influence others. Everything we say or do is examined and interpreted by others for clues as to our intentions.

I am not interested in power for power’s sake, but I’m interested in power that is moral, that is right and that is good.