Background Image

...

A Woman Has, First Of All, Her Duties In Their Own Home, And There Are Many Women Particularly When They're Young, Who Can Do An Active Job In Their Community Like Being A Mayor, But Who Cannot Go To Washington Or Albany Or Wherever The Capital Of The State Is. There Are Others Who Can, Can Leave Home, Whose Children Are Older And So Forth. I Think It All Is A Personal Decision.

-Eleanor Roosevelt

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

A Woman Has, First

Eleanor Roosevelt

...

A Woman Has, First Of All, Her Duties In Their Own Home, And There Are Many Women Particularly When They're Young, Who Can Do An Active Job In Their Community Like Being A Mayor, But Who Cannot Go To Washington Or Albany Or Wherever The Capital Of The State Is. There Are Others Who Can, Can Leave Home, Whose Children Are Older And So Forth. I Think It All Is A Personal Decision.

Views: 15547

Topic

More From Eleanor Roosevelt

I Have Complete Faith In The American People's Ability If They Know And If They Have Leadership.

When Will Our Consciences Grow So Tender That We Will Act To Prevent Human Misery Rather Than Avenge It?

The Greatest Tragedy Of Old Age Is The Tendency For The Old To Feel Unneeded, Unwanted, And Of No Use To Anyone; The Secret Of Happiness In The Declining Years Is To Remain Interested In Life, As Active As Possible, Useful To Others, Busy, And Forward Looking.

If Someone Betrays You Once, It’s Their Fault; If They Betray You Twice, It’s Your Fault.

Nothing Alive Can Stand Still, It Goes Forward Or Back. Life Is Interesting Only As Long As It Is A Process Of Growth; Or, To Put It Another Way, We Can Only Grow As Long As We Are Interested.

It Is Equality Of Monotony Which Makes The Strength Of The British Isles.

The Fundamental Right Of Freedom Of Thought And Expression Is Essential. If You Curtail What The Other Fellow Says And Does, You Curtail What You Yourself May Say And Do.

Courage Is More Exhilarating Than Fear And In The Long Run It Is Easier. We Do Not Have To Become Heroes Over Night. Just A Step At A Time, Meeting Each Thing That Comes Up, Seeing It Is Not As Dreadful As It Appeared, Discovering We Have The Strength To Stare It Down.

Autobiographies Are Only Useful As The Lives You Read About And Analyze May Suggest To You Something That You May Find Useful In Your Own Journey Through Life.

I Have Spent Many Years Of My Life In Opposition, And I Rather Like The Role.

No One Can Insult You Without Your Permission.

If We Fail To Meet Our Problems Here, No One Else In The World Will Do So. If We Fail, The Heart Goes Out Of Progressives Throughout The World.

I Have Learned Long Ago To Possess My Soul In Patience And Accept The Inevitable.

Most Of The Work That's Done In The World Gets Done By People Who Weren't Feeling All That Well At The Time That They Did It.

We Can No Longer Oversimplify. We Can No Longer Build Lazy And False Stereotypes: Americans Are Like This, Russians Are Like That, A Jew Behaves In Such A Way, A Negro Thinks In A Different Way. The Lazy Generalities - 'you Know How Women Are ... Isn't That Just Like A Man?' The World Cannot Be Understood From A Single Point Of View.

... Any Citizen Should Be Willing To Give All That He Has To Give His Country In Work Or Sacrifice In Times Of Crisis.

It Is A Brave Thing To Have Courage To Be An Individual; It Is Also, Perhaps, A Lonely Thing. But It Is Better Than Not Being An Individual, Which Is To Be Nobody At All.

The Labor Movement Has A Great Role To Play In Our Country Today.

A Great Deal Of Fear Is A Result Of Just “not Knowing.” We Do Not Know What Is Involved In A New Situation. We Do Not Know Whether We Can Deal With It. The Sooner We Learn What It Entails, The Sooner We Can Dissolve Our Fear.

A Successful Life For A Man Or For A Woman Seems To Me To Lie In The Knowledge That One Has Developed To The Limit The Capacities With Which One Was Endowed; That One Has Contributed Something Constructive To Family And Friends And To A Home Community; That One Has Brought Happiness Wherever It Was Possible; That One Has Earned One's Way In The World, Has Kept Some Friends, And Need Not Be Ashamed To Face Oneself Honestly.

Happiness Is Not A Goal, It Is A By-product. For What Keeps Our Interest In Life And Makes Us Look Forward To Tomorrow Is Giving Pleasure To Other People.

The Most Important Thing In Any Relationship Is Not What You Get But What You Give.... In Any Case, The Giving Of Love Is An Education In Itself.

Curiosity Must Be Kept Alive.

Inspirational Life

Life Is What You Make It. Always Has Been, Always Will Be.

The Kind Of Propaganda That Some Of The Religious Groups, Aided And Abetted By The Opposition, Put Forth In That Campaign Utterly Disgusted Me. If I Needed Anything To Show Me What Prejudice Can Do To The Intelligence Of Human Beings That Campaign Was The Best Lesson I Could Have Had.

... The Next War Will Be A War In Which People Not Armies Will Suffer, And Our Boasted, Hard-earned Civilization Will Do Us No Good. Cannot The Women Rise To This Great Opportunity And Work Now, And Not Have The Double Horror, If Another War Comes, Of Losing Their Loved Ones, And Knowing That They Lifted No Finger When They Might Have Worked Hard?

It Is Our Freedom To Progress That Makes Us All Want To Live And To Go On.

Tomorrow Is A Mystery. Today Is A Gift. That Is Why It Is Called The Present.

Do One Thing Everyday That Scares You. Those Small Things That Make Us Uncomfortable Help Us Build Courage To Do The Work We Do.

After The Discovery In 1918 Of Love Letters Revealing That Franklin Was Involved With Lucy Mercer: The Bottom Dropped Out Of My Own Particular World, I Faced Myself, My Surroundings, My World, Honestly For The First Time.

The Only Advantage Of Not Being Too Good A Housekeeper Is That Your Guests Are So Pleased To Feel How Very Much Better They Are.

It Takes Courage To Love, But Pain Through Love Is The Purifying Fire Which Those Who Love Generously Know. We All Know People Who Are So Much Afraid Of Pain That They Shut Themselves Up Like Clams In A Shell And, Giving Out Nothing, Receive Nothing And Therefore Shrink Until Life Is A Mere Living Death.

I Have Always Seen Life Personally; My Interest Or Sympathy Or Indignation Is Not Aroused By An Abstract Cause But By The Plight Of A Single Person...out Of My Response To An Individual Develops An Awareness Of A Problem To The Community, Then To The Country, Then To The World.

It Seems To Me That I Cannot Afford, As A Self-respecting Individual, To Refuse To Do A Thing Merely Because It Will Make Me Disliked Or Bring Down A Storm Of Criticism On My Head.

True Hospitality Consists Of Giving The Best Of Yourself To Your Guests.

I Believe That All That We Go Through Here Must Have Some Value.

Do Something Everyday That Scares You.

Each Time You Learn Something New You Must Readjust The Whole Framework Of Your Knowledge

Criticism ... Makes Very Little Dent Upon Me, Unless I Think There Is Some Real Justification And Something Should Be Done.

Where, After All, Do Universal Human Rights Begin? In Small Places, Close To Home - So Close And So Small That They Cannot Be Seen On Any Maps Of The World ... Such Are The Places Where Every Man, Woman And Child Seeks Equal Justice, Equal Opportunity, Equal Dignity Without Discrimination. Unless These Rights Have Meaning There, They Have Little Meaning Anywhere.

The Only Joy In This Hard Life Is Serving Others.

One Should Always Sleep In All Of One's Guest Beds, To Make Sure That They Are Comfortable.

I Think The Thing We Must Look For Actually Is A Growth In Our People And In Whoever Comes In A Quality Of Courage To Tell Our People Just What World Conditions Are.

...real Prosperity Can Only Come When Everybody Prospers.

...so Much Attention Is Paid To The Aggressive Sins, Such As Violence And Cruelty, And Greed With All Their Tragic Effects, That Too Little Attention Is Paid To The Passive Sins, Such As Apathy And Laziness, Which In The Long Run Can Have A More Devastating And Destructive Effect Upon Society Than The Others.

If We Want A Free And Peaceful World, If We Want To Make The Deserts Bloom And Man Grow To Greater Dignity As A Human Being - We Can Do It.

I Have A Great Belief In Spiritual Force, But I Think We Have To Realize That Spiritual Force Alone Has To Have Material Force With It So Long As We Live In A Material World. The Two Together Make A Strong Combination.

Where, After All, Do Universal Human Rights Begin? In Small Places, Close To Home - So Close And So Small That They Cannot Be Seen On Any Maps Of The World. Yet They Are The World Of The Individual Person...withou T Concerted Citizen Action To Uphold Them Close To Home, We Shall Look In Vain For Progress In The Larger World.

We Have To Face The Fact That Either All Of Us Are Going To Die Together Or We Are Going To Learn To Live Together And If We Are To Live Together We Have To Talk.

If Man Is To Be Liberated To Enjoy More Leisure, He Must Also Be Prepared To Enjoy This Leisure Fully And Creatively.

Do The Things That Interest You And Do Them With All Your Heart. Don't Be Concerned About Whether People Are Watching You Or Criticizing You. The Chances Are That They Aren't Paying Attention To You.

To Appear To Be On The Inside And Know More Than Others About What Is Going On Is A Great Temptation For Most People. It Is A Rare Person Who Is Willing To Seem To Know Less Than He Does ... Somehow, People Seem To Feel That It Is Belittling To Their Importance Not To Know More Than Other People.

Change Means The Unknown.

To Be A Citizen In A Democracy, A Human Being Must Be Given A Healthy Start.

It Is Always Disagreeable To Take Stands. It Is Always Easier To Compromise, Always Easier To Let Things Go. To Many Women, And I Am One Of Them, It Is Extraordinarily Difficult To Care About Anything Enough To Cause Disagreement Or Unpleasant Feelings, But I Have Come To The Conclusion That This Must Be Done For A Time Until We Can Prove Our Strength And Demand Respect For Our Wishes. We Cannot Even Be Of Real Service In The Coming Campaign And Speak As A United Body Of Women Unless We Have The Respect Of Men And Show That When We Express A Wish, We Are Willing To Stand By It.

We All Grow Older And We All Have To Live With Ourselves.

Beautiful Young People Are Accidents Of Nature, But Beautiful Old People Are Works Of Art.

I Never Waste Time Looking Back.

The Basis Of World Peace Is The Teaching Which Runs Through Almost All The Great Religions Of The World. "love Thy Neighbor As Thyself." Christ, Some Of The Other Great Jewish Teachers, Buddha, All Preached It. Their Followers Forgot It. What Is The Trouble Between Capital And Labor, What Is The Trouble In Many Of Our Communities, But Rather A Universal Forgetting That This Teaching Is One Of Our First Obligations.

There Are Practical Little Things In Housekeeping Which No Man Really Understands.

Perhaps Nature Is Our Best Assurance Of Immortality.

Campaign Behavior For Wives: Always Be On Time. Do As Little Talking As Humanly Possible. Lean Back In The Parade Car So Everybody Can See The President.

...conservation Of Land And Conservation Of People Frequently Go Hand In Hand.

Most Women, I Think, Though They May Complain A Little About This, Would Agree That Meeting The Needs Of Others Is Not A Real Burden; It Is What Makes Life Worth Living. It Is Probably The Deepest Satisfaction A Woman Has.

Probably The Happiest Period In Life Most Frequently Is In Middle Age, When The Eager Passions Of Youth Are Cooled, And The Infirmities Of Age Not Yet Begun; As We See That The Shadows, Which Are At Morning And Evening So Large, Almost Entirely Disappear At Midday.

Sometimes It Is Extremely Good For You To Forget That There Is Anything In The World Which Needs To Be Done, And To Do Some Particular Thing That You Want To Do. Every Human Being Needs A Certain Amount Of Time In Which He Can Be Peaceful.

...no Matter How Avid They Themselves May Be For Praise And Appreciation, People Are Often Niggardly In Giving It To Others, However Merited It Is.

A Little Simplification Would Be The First Step Toward Rational Living, I Think.

Inspirational Life

Sailors Have The Cleanest Bodies And The Filthiest Minds.

You Gain Strength, Courage, And Confidence By Every Experience In Which You Really Stop To Look Fear In The Face.... The Danger Lies In Refusing To Face The Fear, In Not Daring To Come To Grips With It. If You Fail Anywhere Along The Line It Will Take Away Your Confidence. You Must Make Yourself Succeed Every Time. You Must Do The Thing You Think You Cannot Do.

A Mature Person Is One Who Does Not Think Only In Absolutes, Who Is Able To Be Objective Even When Deeply Stirred Emotionally, Who Has Learned That There Is Both Good And Bad In All People And In All Things, And Who Walks Humbly And Deals Charitably With The Circumstances Of Life, Knowing That In This World No One Is All Knowing And Therefore All Of Us Need Both Love And Charity.

Everybody Wants Something.

The Mobilization Of World Opinion And Methods Of Negotiation Should Be Developed And Used By Every Nation In Order To Strengthen The United Nations.

Life Must Be Lived And Curiosity Kept Alive. One Must Never, For Whatever Reason, Turn His Back On Life.

Remember, No One Can Make You Feel Inferior Without Being Related To You And Repeatedly Questioning Why You're In Nonprofit.

Questioning Why

There Are No Have-to's, Just Choices

It Is Today That We Create The World Of The Future.

Before We Can Make Friends With Anyone Else, We Must First Make Friends With Ourselves.

Curiously Enough, It Is Often The People Who Refuse To Assume Any Responsibility Who Are Apt To Be The Sharpest Critics Of Those Who Do.

Surely, In The Light Of History, It Is More Intelligent To Hope Rather Than To Fear, To Try Rather Than Not To Try. For One Thing We Know Beyond All Doubt: Nothing Has Ever Been Achieved By The Person Who Says: It Can't Be Done.

Every Age Is An Unknown Country.

I Believe That Anyone Can Conquer Fear By Doing The Things He Fears To Do, Provided He Keeps Doing Them Until He Gets A Record Of Successful Experience Behind Him.

Somewhere Along The Line Of Development We Discover What We Really Are And Then Make Our Real Decision For Which We Are Responsible. Make That Decision Primarily For Yourself Because You Can Never Really Live Anyone Else's Lie, Not Even Your Child's. The Influence You Exert Is Through Your Own Life And What You Become Yourself.

We Gain Strength, And Courage, And Confidence By Each Experience In Which We Really Stop To Look Fear In The Face... We Must Do That Which We Think We Cannot.

We Stand Today At The Threshold Of A Great Event Both In The Life Of The United Nations And In The Life Of Mankind, That Is The Approval By The General Assembly Of The Universal Declaration Of Human Rights.

The American Dream Can No More Remain Static Than Can The American Nation.... We Cannot Any Longer Take An Old Approach To World Problems. They Aren't The Same Problems. It Isn't The Same World. We Must Not Adopt The Methods Of Our Ancestors; Instead, We Must Emulate That Pioneer Quality In Our Ancestors That Made Them Attempt New Methods For A New World.

People Who 'view With Alarm' Never Build Anything.

Our Real Battlefield Today Is Asia And Our Real Battle Is The One Between Democracy And Communism. . . . We Have To Prove To The World And Particularly To Downtrodden Areas Of The World Which Are The Natural Prey To The Principles Of Communist Economics That Democracy Really Brings About Happier And Better Conditions For The People As A Whole.

Caring Comes From Being Able To Put Yourself In The Position Of The Other Person.

We Must Know What We Think And Speak Out, Even At The Risk Of Unpopularity.

Comparison Is The Thief Of All Joy.

Women Are Like Tea Bags.they Do Not Know How Strong They Are Until They Get Into Hot Water.

The Bible Illustrated By Dore Occupied Many Of My Hours - And I Think Probably Gave Me Many Nightmares.

No One Is All-knowing And Therefore All Of Us Need Both Love And Charity.

Philosophy Is Not Best Expressed In Words; It Is Expressed In The Choices One Makes.

To Some Of Us, Hunger Was More Academic Than Real, But We Must Try To Develop The Ability To Feel The Urgency Of Such A Situation.

To Tell The People In The West Not To Use Their Cars Means That These People May Never See Another Soul For Weeks And Weeks Nor Have A Way Of Getting A Sick Person To A Doctor.

Do The Things That Interest You And Do Them With All Your Heart.

An Economic Policy Which Does Not Consider The Well-being Of All Will Not Serve The Purposes Of Peace And The Growth Of Well-being Among The People Of All Nations.

Every Day Do Something That Frightens You.

Furnish An Example, Stop Preaching, Stop Shielding, Don't Prevent Self-reliance And Initiative, Allow Your Children To Develop Along Thier Own Lines.

There Is In Every Country An Antipathy To The Foreigner.

Perhaps In His Wisdom The Almighty Is Trying To Show Us That A Leader May Chart The Way, May Point Out The Road To Lasting Peace, But That Many Leaders And Many Peoples Must Do The Building.

The Film Industry Is A Great Industry, With Infinite Possibilities For Good And Bad. Its Primary Purpose Is To Entertain People. On The Side, It Can Do Many Other Things. It Can Popularize Certain Ideals, It Can Make Education Palatable. But In The Long Run, The Judge Who Decides Whether What It Does Is Good Or Bad Is The Man Or Woman Who Attends The Movies.

I Received A Most Amusing Postcard The Other Morning. Unfortunately, It Was Not Signed In A Readable Manner So I Cannot Answer It Privately. But It Comes From Moblie, Ala., And Says: 'dear Mrs. Roosevelt: You Have Not Answered My Question, The Amount Of Negro Blood You Have In Your Veins, If Any.' I Am Afraid None Of Us Know How Much Nor What Kind Of Blood We Have In Our Veins, Since Chemically It Is All The Same. And Most Of Us Cannot Trace Our Ancestry More Than A Few Generations.

If You Approach Each New Person You Meet In A Spirit Of Adventure, You Will Find Yourself Endlessly Fascinated By The New Channels Of Thought And Experience And Personality That You Encounter.

I Carried It (a Revolver) Religiously And During The Summer I Asked A Friend, A Man Who Had Been One Of Franklin's Bodyguards In New York State, To Give Me Some Practice In Target Shooting So That If The Need Arose I Would Know How To Use The Gun.

I'm So Glad I Never Feel Important, It Does Complicate Life!

Long Ago, I Made Up My Mind That, When Things Were Said Involving Only Me, I Would Pay No Attention To Them, Except When Valid Criticism Was Carried By Which I Could Profit.

You Can't Move So Fast That You Try To Change The Mores Faster Than People Can Accept It.

Sometimes I Wonder If We Shall Ever Grow Up In Our Politics And Say Definite Things Which Mean Something, Or Whether We Shall Always Go On Using Generalities To Which Everyone Can Subscribe, And Which Mean Very Little.

No One Can Make You Feel Inferior Without Your Consent.

So I Took An Interest In Politics, But I Don't Know Whether I Enjoyed It! It Was A Wife's Duty To Be Interested In Whatever Interested Her Husband, Whether It Was Politics, Books, Or A Particular Dish For Dinner.

If You Have Any Interests You Can Gain A Wider Audience For Those Interests While The Goldfish Bowl Is Yours!

Too Often The Great Decisions Are Originated And Given Form In Bodies Made Up Wholly Of Men, Or So Completely Dominated By Them That Whatever Of Special Value Women Have To Offer Is Shunted Aside Without Expression.

I Kept Praying That I Might Be Able To Prevent A Repetition Of This Stupidity Called War. I Have Tried To Keep The Promise I Made To Myself, But The Progress That The World Is Making Toward Peace Seems Like The Crawling Of A Little Child, Very Halting And Slow.

Happiness Is Not A Goal; It Is A By-product.

Poor Minds Talk About People Average Minds Talk About Events Great Minds Talk About Ideas

It Seems To Me Of Great Importance To Teach Children Respect For Life. Towards This End, Experiments On Living Animals In Classrooms Should Be Stopped. To Encourage Cruelty In The Name Of Science Can Only Destroy The Finer Emotions Of Affection And Sympathy, And Breed An Unfeeling Callousness In The Young Towards Suffering In All Living Creatures.

To Undo A Mistake Is Always Harder Than Not To Create One Originally But We Seldom Have The Foresight. Therefore We Have No Choice But To Try To Correct Our Past Mistakes.

All Big Things In Human History Have Been Arrived At Slowly And Through Many Compromises.

All Of Us ... Should Remember That No Amount Of Flag-waving, Pledging Allegiance, Or Fervent Singing Of The National Anthem Is Evidence That We Are Patriotic In The Real Sense Of The Word. ... Outward Behavior, While Important, Is Not The Real Measure Of A Man's Patriotism.

... Many Of The Things Which We Deplore, The Prevalence Of Tuberculosis, The Mounting Record Of Crime In Certain Sections Of The Country, Are Not Due Just To Lack Of Education And To Physical Differences, But Are Due In Great Part To The Basic Fact Of Segregation Which We Have Set Up In This Country And Which Warps And Twists The Lives Not Only Of Our Negro Population, But Sometimes Of Foreign Born Or Even Of Religious Groups.

...but There Isn't Going To Be Any First Lady. There Is Just To Be Plain, Ordinary Mrs. Roosevelt...i Never Wanted To Be The President's Wife, And Don't Want It Now. You Don't Quite Believe Me, Do You? Very Likely No One Would-except Possibly Some Woman Who Had Had The Job.

Perhaps The Basic Thing Which Contributes To Charm Is The Ability To Forget Oneself And Be Engrossed In Other People.

As Life Developed, I Faced Each Problem As It Came Along. As My Activities And Work Broadened And Reached Out, I Never Tried To Shirk. I Tried Never To Evade An Issue. When I Found I Had Something To Do--i Just Did It.

You Can Often Change Your Circumstances By Changing Your Attitude

Courage Is Exhilarating.

I Wonder If One Of The Penalties Of Growing Older Is That You Become More And More Conscious That Nothing Is Very Permanent.

We Are Given In Our Newspapers And On Tv And Radio Exactly What We, The Public, Insist On Having, And This Very Frequently Is Mediocre Information And Mediocre Entertainment.

The Purpose Of Life Is To Live It, To Taste Experience To The Utmost, To Reach Out Eagerly And Without Fear For Newer And Richer Experience.

People Can Only Make You Inferior With Your Consent.

You Rarely Achieve Finality. If You Did, Life Would Be Over, But As You Strive New Visions Open Before You, New Possibilities For The Satisfaction Of Living.

When You Look Fear In The Face, You Are Able To Say To Yourself, 'i Lived Through This Horror. I Can Take The Next Thing That Comes Along.'

This Is A Strange, Little, Complacent Country [switzerland], In Many Ways A Usa In Miniature But Of Course Nearer The Center Of Disturbance!

The Future Is Literally In Our Hands To Mold As We Like. But We Cannot Wait Until Tomorrow. Tomorrow Is Now.

I Can Not Believe That War Is The Best Solution. No One Won The Last War, And No One Will Win The Next War.

I Don't Know Much About Capitalism, But I Do Know About Democracy And Freedom, And If Capitalism May Change In Many, Many Ways, I'm Not Really Very Much Interested In Capitalism.

No One From The Beginning Of Time Has Had Security.

The Economy Of Communism Is An Economy Which Grows In An Atmosphere Of Misery And Want.

Lest I Keep My Complacent Way I Must Remember Somewhere Out There A Person Died For Me Today. As Long As There Must Be War, I Ask And I Must Answer Was I Worth Dying For?

The Mind Must Be Trained, Rather Than The Memory.

So, After All, We Are But Puppets, Creatures Of Our Fate, Not Commanding It But Being Molded By It.

Remember Always That You Have Not Only The Right To Be An Individual; You Have An Obligation To Be One.

Feelings, Too, Are Facts. Emotion Is A Fact. Human Experience Is A Fact. It Is Often Possible To Gain More Real Insight Into Human Beings And Their Motivation By Reading Great Fiction Than By Personal Acquaintance.

I Am Convinced That Every Effort Must Be Made In Childhood To Teach The Young To Use Their Own Minds. For One Thing Is Sure: If They Don't Make Up Their Minds, Someone Will Do It For Them.

There Is Not Human Being From Whom We Cannot Learn Something If We Are Interested Enough To Dig Deep.

When You Adopt The Standards And The Values Of Someone Else … You Surrender Your Own Integrity. You Become, To The Extent Of Your Surrender, Less Of A Human Being.

At All Times, Day By Day, We Have To Continue Fighting For Freedom Of Religion, Freedom Of Speech, And Freedom From Want... For These Are Things That Must Be Gained In Peace As Well As In War.

What I Have Learned From My Own Experience Is That The Most Important Ingredients In A Child's Education Are Curiosity, Interest, Imagination, And A Sense Of The Adventure Of Life.

Staying Aloof Is Not A Solution, It Is A Cowardly Evasion.

You Wouldn't Worry So Much About What Others Think Of You If You Realized How Seldom They Do.

I Think That Somehow, We Learn Who We Really Are And Then Live With That Decision.

About The Only Value The Story Of My Life May Have Is To Show That One Can, Even Without Any Particular Gifts, Overcome Obstacles That Seem Insurmountable If One Is Willing To Face The Fact That They Must Be Overcome.

We Must Want For Others, Not Ourselves Alone.

Practically Nothing We Do Ever Stands By Itself. If It Is Good, It Will Serve Some Good Purpose In The Future. If It Is Evil, It May Haunt Us And Handicap Our Efforts In Unimagined Ways.

It Is Curious How Much More Interest Can Be Evoked By A Mixture Of Gossip, Romance And Mystery Than By Facts.

No Writing Has Any Real Value Which Is Not The Expression Of Genuine Thought And Feeling.

The Marines I Have Seen Around The World Have The Cleanest Bodies, The Filthiest Minds, The Highest Morale, And The Lowest Morals Of Any Group Of Animals I Have Ever Seen. Thank God For The United States Marine Corps!

Ambition Is Pitiless. Any Merit That It Cannot Use It Finds Despicable.

One Has To Live In Washington To Know What A City Of Rumors It Is.

The War For Freedom Will Never Really Be Won Because The Price Of Freedom Is Constant Vigilance Over Ourselves And Over Our Government.

Libertarian Party

We Must Be Willing To Learn The Lesson That Cooperation May Imply Compromise, But If It Brings A World Advance It Is A Gain For Each Individual Nation.

I Have Never Believed That War Settled Anything Satisfactorily, But I Am Not Entirely Sure That Some Times There Are Certain Situations In The World Such As We Have In Actuality When A Country Is Worse Off When It Does Not Go To War For Its Principles Than If It Went To War.

We Will Have To Want Peace, Want It Enough To Pay For It, Before It Becomes An Accepted Rule.

Poverty Is An Expensive Luxury. We Cannot Afford It.

We Women Are Callow Fledglings As Compared With The Wise Old Birds Who Manipulate The Political Machinery, And We Still Hesitate To Believe That A Woman Can Fill Certain Positions In Public Life As Competently And Adequately As A Man. For Instance, It Is Certain That Women Do Not Want A Woman For President. Nor Would They Have The Slightest Confidence In Her Ability To Fulfill The Functions Of That Office. Every Woman Who Fails In A Public Position Confirms This, But Every Woman Who Succeeds Creates Confidence.

Friendship With Ones Self Is All Important, Because Without It One Cannot Be Friends With Anyone Else In The World.

...without Equality There Can Be No Democracy.

If Anyone Were To Ask Me What I Want Out Of Life I Would Say- The Opportunity For Doing Something Useful, For In No Other Way, I Am Convinced, Can True Happiness Be Attained.

Be Flexible, But Stick To Your Principles.

Franklin's Illness...gave Him Strength And Courage He Had Not Had Before. He Had To Think Out The Fundamentals Of Living And Learn The Greatest Of All Lessons - Infinite Patience And Never Ending Persistence.

The Choices We Make Are Ultimately Our Responsibility.

Personal Accountability

Mahatma Gandhi I Would Say Had Perhaps A Greater Spiritual Quality Whereas Winston Churchill Had Besides The Courage, Ability And Above Everything Else, The Ability To Put Into Words What His People Felt So That He Could Always Lead Them. And My Own Husband I Think Had Great Patience, Which You Need In A Democracy Because You Have To Come To Do Fundamental Things, You Have To Have The Patience To Have People Educated; And Then I Think He Had A Deep Interest In Human Beings As Human Beings.

How Hard It Is To Project Oneself Into The Future. We Are Always Prone To Think Of The Conditions Which Are With Us Today As Being Permanent Conditions.

There Is No More Precious Experience In Life Than Friendship. And I Am Not Forgetting Love And Marriage As I Write This; The Lovers, Or The Man And Wife, Who Are Not Friends Are But Weakly Joined Together. One Enlarges His Circle Of Friends Through Contact With Many People. One Who Limits Those Contacts Narrows The Circle And Frequently His Own Point Of View As Well.

The Hard Part Of Loving Is That One Has To Learn So Often To Let Go Of Those We Love, So They Can Do Things, So They Can Grow, So They Can Return To Us With An Even Richer, Deeper Love.

To A Certain Extent I Don't See Any Real Need For Socialism In The United States Immediately, But Things Change And It May Be That There Will Come A Need For Partial Changes In Our Economy.

This Is A Time For Action Not For War, But For Mobilization Of Every Bit Of Peace Machinery.

Friendship With Oneself Is All Important.

Actors Are One Family Over The Entire World.

The Kind Of Man Who Thinks That Helping With The Dishes Is Beneath Him Will Also Think That Helping With The Baby Is Beneath Him, And Then He Certainly Is Not Going To Be A Very Successful Father.

A Candle Can Bring Light To A Dungeon But It Can Also Be Used To Light A Deadly Marijuana Cigarette.

No One Can Move Without Some Leadership.

The Important Thing Is Neither Your Nationality Nor The Religion You Professed, But How Your Faith Translated Itself In Your Life.

Important Things

Nobody Else Is Going To Do The Things Which Are Yours To Be Done In The World.

I Know That We Will Be The Sufferers If We Let Great Wrongs Occur Without Exerting Ourselves To Correct Them.

The Most Important Word In The English Language Is Hope.

Life's Not About Expecting, Hoping And Wishing. It's About Doing, Being And Becoming. It's About T Learn From The Mistakes Of Others. You Can't Live Long Enough To Make Them All Yourself.

Every Woman Wants To Be First To Someone Sometime In Her Life And That Desire Is The Explanation For Many Strange Things Women Do.

To Be Mature You Have To Realize What You Value Most... Not To Arrive At A Clear Understanding Of One's Own Values Is A Tragic Waste. You Have Missed The Whole Point Of What Life Is For.

Be Confident, Not Certain

There Is Nothing To Fear Except Fear It's Self.

Only A Man's Character Is The Real Criterion Of Worth.

Spiritual Leadership Should Remain Spiritual Leadership And The Temporal Power Should Not Become Too Important In Any Church.

Do What You Feel In Your Heart To Be Right - For You'll Be Criticized Anyway. You'll Be Damned If You Do, And Damned If You Don't.

The Future Belongs To Those Who Believe In The Beauty Of Their Dreams.

If Human Beings Can Be Trained For Cruelty And Greed And A Belief In Power Which Comes Through Hate And Fear And Force, Certainly We Can Train Equally Well For Greatness And Mercy And The Power Of Love Which Comes Because Of The Strength Of The Good Qualities To Be Found In The Soul Of Every Human Being.

I Could Not, At Any Age, Be Content To Take My Place By The Fireside And Simply Look On. Life Was Meant To Be Lived. Curiosity Must Be Kept Alive. One Must Not, For Whatever Reason, Turn His Back On Life." Another "no One Can Make You Feel Inferior Without Your Consent.

The Giving Of Love And Understanding Is An Education In Itself.

Trending Author

Masashi Kishimoto

Edward Hoagland

King Edward VIII

Jada Pinkett Smith

Annabella Sciorra

Category