The original reason to start the project, which was that the Germans were a danger, started me off on a process of action, which was to try to develop this first system at Princeton and then at Los Alamos, to try to make the bomb work.

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

There are risks and costs to action. But they are far less than the long range risks of comfortable inaction.

Life is to be lived. If you have to support yourself, you had bloody well better find some way that is going to be interesting. And you don’t do that by sitting around.

If danger arises in the present moment, there may be an emotion. There may even be pain. But that’s a challenge, not a problem. For a problem to exist, you need time and repetitive mind activity.

Action expresses priorities.

To see the right and not to do it is cowardice.

As far as U.S. intelligence knows, Iran is developing nuclear capacities, but they don’t know if they are trying to develop nuclear weapons or not. Chances are they’re developing what’s called ‚nuclear capability,‘ which many states have. That is the ability to have nuclear weapons if they decide to do it. That’s not a crime.

Great talents are the most lovely and often the most dangerous fruits on the tree of humanity. They hang upon the most slender twigs that are easily snapped off.

Once we start to act, hope is everywhere. So instead of looking for hope, look for action. Then, and only then, hope will come.

With a tree, all the growth takes place at the growing tips. Humanity is exactly the same. All the growth takes place in the growing tip: among that one percent of the population. It’s made up of pioneers, the beginners. That’s where the action is.

When I was in the White House, I was confronted with the challenge of the Cold War. Both the Soviet Union and I had 30,000 nuclear weapons that could destroy the entire earth and I had to maintain the peace.

When you have enough understanding and compassion in you, then that amount of understanding and compassion will try to express itself in action. And your practice should help you to cultivate more understanding and compassion.

Al Qaeda is almost all in Pakistan, and Pakistan has nuclear weapons. And yet for every dollar we’re spending in Pakistan, we’re spending $30 in Afghanistan. Does that make strategic sense?

If you want to conquer fear, don’t sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.

Never confuse motion with action.

Omnipotence is not knowing how everything is done; it’s just doing it.

Life was always a matter of waiting for the right moment to act.

The aphorism in which I am the first master among Germans, are the forms of ‚eternity‘; my ambition is to say in ten sentences what everyone else says in a book – what everyone else does not say in a book.

Well done is better than well said.

No one that encounters prosperity does not also encounter danger.

Without education we are in a horrible and deadly danger of taking educated people seriously.

I undertake the same project as Montaigne, but with an aim contrary to his own: for he wrote his Essays only for others, and I write my reveries only for myself.

Success is always dangerous, and we need to be alert and avoid becoming the victims of our own success. Will we influence the world for Christ, or will the world influence us?

We are always doing something for posterity, but I would fain see posterity do something for us.

Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.

My ultimate life dream project is my kids. My family.

Action is the real measure of intelligence.

What you don’t do can be a destructive force.

Men’s actions are too strong for them. Show me a man who has acted, and who has not been the victim and slave of his action.

I spent more time on dark ships in danger zones than any other woman in the world.

Constant exposure to dangers will breed contempt for them.

Action is character.

We give speeches and pin ribbons onto uniforms, etch names into walls. And all that is fine, but too often, all those tributes, all those words aren’t always backed up by action. And that felt like such a stark contrast to me, because, as we all know, our military is all about action.

If we must not act save on a certainty, we ought not to act on religion, for it is not certain. But how many things we do on an uncertainty, sea voyages, battles!

As soon as there is life there is danger.

America must not ignore the threat gathering against us. Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot wait for the final proof, the smoking gun that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud.

Prayer is not an old woman’s idle amusement. Properly understood and applied, it is the most potent instrument of action.

The CIA is made up of boys whose families sent them to Princeton but wouldn’t let them into the family brokerage business.

Action speaks louder than words but not nearly as often.

We’re in greater danger today than we were the day after Pearl Harbor. Our military is absolutely incapable of defending this country.

There are a few other things that I built when I was at Harvard that were kind of smaller versions of Facebook. One such program was this program called Match. People could enter the different courses that they were taking, and see what other courses would be correlated with the courses they are taking.

The fishermen know that the sea is dangerous and the storm terrible, but they have never found these dangers sufficient reason for remaining ashore.

To a profound pessimist about life, being in danger is not depressing.

Nothing is more terrible than to see ignorance in action.

I never worry about action, but only inaction.

The only man who never makes a mistake is the man who never does anything.

The shortest answer is doing the thing.

All action takes place, so to speak, in a kind of twilight, which like a fog or moonlight, often tends to make things seem grotesque and larger than they really are.

We are not going to be satisfied by politicians saying ‚we support you‘ and then walking away. We won’t be satisfied until they meet our demands and act. That’s why simply taking a selfie or posting support on Twitter isn’t enough. That’s why we have to keep striking.

It is a no-fail, incontrovertible reality: If you get, give. If you learn, teach. You can’t do anything with that except do it.

Ideas have a short shelf life. You must act on them before the expiration date.

Everywhere in life, the true question is not what we gain, but what we do.

What it lies in our power to do, it lies in our power not to do.

Whatever you do may seem insignificant to you, but it is most important that you do it.

I call upon the scientific community in our country, those who gave us nuclear weapons, to turn their great talents now to the cause of mankind and world peace: to give us the means of rendering these nuclear weapons impotent and obsolete.

Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.

We must not sit still and look for miracles; up and doing, and the Lord will be with thee. Prayer and pains, through faith in Christ Jesus, will do anything.

Besides entertainment and action, I want to educate. You know, as a producer or director, we do have a responsibility to society.

Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing.

We should seek the greatest value of our action.