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The Prospect Of Penury In Age Is So Gloomy And Terrifying That Every Man Who Looks Before Him Must Resolve To Avoid It; And It Must Be Avoided Generally By The Science Of Sparing. For, Though In Every Age There Are Some Who, By Bold Adventures, Or By Favorable Accidents, Rise Suddenly To Riches, Yet It Is Dangerous To Indulge Hopes Of Such Rare Events; And The Bulk Of Mankind Must Owe Their Affluence To Small And Gradual Profits, Below Which Their Expense Must Be Resolutely Reduced.

-Lyndon B. Johnson

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The Prospect Of Penury

Lyndon B. Johnson

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The Prospect Of Penury In Age Is So Gloomy And Terrifying That Every Man Who Looks Before Him Must Resolve To Avoid It; And It Must Be Avoided Generally By The Science Of Sparing. For, Though In Every Age There Are Some Who, By Bold Adventures, Or By Favorable Accidents, Rise Suddenly To Riches, Yet It Is Dangerous To Indulge Hopes Of Such Rare Events; And The Bulk Of Mankind Must Owe Their Affluence To Small And Gradual Profits, Below Which Their Expense Must Be Resolutely Reduced.

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Congratulations

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Freedom Of Speech

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You Know, Doing What Is Right Is Easy. The Problem Is Knowing What Is Right.

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New Experiences

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I Am Afraid, ... That Health Begins, After Seventy, And Often Long Before, To Have A Meaning Different From That Which It Had At Thirty. But It Is Culpable To Murmur At The Established Order Of The Creation, As It Is Vain To Oppose It. He That Lives, Must Grow Old; And He That Would Rather Grow Old Than Die, Has God To Thank For The Infirmities Of Old Age.

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Knowledge Is Of Two Kinds: We Know A Subject Itself, Or Know Where To Find It.

Whether We Are New Dealer, Old Dealer, Liberty Leaguer Or Red, Whether We Agree Or Not, We Still Have The Right To Think And Speak How We Feel.

I Am Proud To Be A Member Of A Party That Opens Its Doors To All Men--and Closes Its Hearts To None.

I Wake Up 5 A.m. Some Mornings And Hear The Planes Coming In At National Airport And I Think They Are Bombing Me.

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If A Single Act Of Folly Was More Responsible For This Explosion Than Any Other It Was The Arbitrary And Dangerous Announced Decision That The Straits Of Tiran Would Be Closed. The Right Of Innocent, Maritime Passage Must Be Preserved For All Nations

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I Am A Compromiser And Maneuverer. I Try To Get Something. That's The Way Our System Works.

As The House Is Designed To Provide A Reflection Of The Mood Of The Moment, The Senate Is Meant To Reflect The Continuity Of The Past--to Preserve The Delicate Balance Of Justice Between The Majority's Whims And The Minority's Rights.

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Greater Love Hath No Man Than To Attend The Episcopal Church With His Wife.

For Every Generation, There Is A Destiny. For Some, History Decides. For This Generation, The Choice Must Be Our Own. [...] Our Destiny In The Midst Of Change Will Rest On The Unchanged Character Of Our People, And On Their Faith.

The Debris Of Civilization Litters The Landscapes And Spoils The Beaches. Conservation's Concerns Now Is Not Only For Man's Enjoyment-but For Man's Survival.

...in The Decline Of Life Shame And Grief Are Of Short Duration; Whether It Be That We Bear Easily What We Have Borne Long; Or That, Finding Ourselves In Age Less Regarded, We Less Regard Others; Or, That We Look With Slight Regard Upon Afflictions To Which We Know That The Hand Of Death Is About To Put An End.

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The Test Before Us As A People Is Not Whether Our Commitments Match Our Will And Our Courage; But Whether We Have The Will And Courage To Match Our Commitments.

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Our Most Tragic Error May Have Been Our Inability To Establish A Rapport And A Confidence With The Press And Television With The Communication Media. I Don't Think The Press Has Understood Me.

I May Not Worry As Much As Prime Minister Eshkol Does About Israel, But I Worry As Deeply.

Curtis Le May Wants To Bomb Hanoi And Haiphong. You Know How He Likes To Go Around Bombing.

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I'm A Powerful S.o.b., You Know That?

You Do Not Take A Person Who, For Years, Has Been Hobbled By Chains And Liberate Him, Bring Him Up To The Starting Line Of A Race And Then Say, "you Are Free To Compete With All The Others," And Still Justly Believe That You Have Been Completely Fair. We Seek Not Just Legal Equity But Human Ability, Not Just Equality As A Right And A Theory But Equality As A Fact And Equality As A Result.

It Will Be Controlled When The People Of America, Through Their Elected Representatives, Demand The Right To Air That They And Their Children Can Breathe Without Fear..

Sometimes Among Our More Sophisticated, Self-styled Intellectuals--and I Say Self-styled Advisedly; The Real Intellectual I Am Notsure Would Ever Feel This Way--some Of Them Are More Concerned With Appearance Than They Are With Achievement. They Are More Concerned With Style Then They Are With Mortar, Brick And Concrete. They Are More Concerned With Trivia And The Superficial Than They Are With The Things That Have Really Built America.

History May Well Record That We Served Liberty And Saved Freedom When We Undertook A Crash Program In The Field Of Education . . .. I Hope This Bill Is Only The Forerunner Of Better Things To Come.

If I Could Get One Message To You It Would Be This: The Future Of This Country And The Welfare Of The Free World Depends Upon Our Success In Space. There Is No Room In This Country For Any But A Fully Cooperative, Urgently Motivated All-out Effort Toward Space Leadership. No One Person, No One Company, No One Government Agency, Has A Monopoly On The Competence, The Missions, Or The Requirements For The Space Program.

For The First Time In Our History It Is Possible To Conquer Poverty.

I Don't Have Any Handicap. I Am All Handicap.

Republicans Simply Don't Know How To Manage The Economy.

Europe Has Been At Peace Since 1945. But It Is A Restless Peace Thats Shadowed By The Threat Of Violence. Europe Is Partitioned. An Unnatural Line Runs Through The Heart Of A Very Great And A Very Proud Nation [germany]. History Warns Us That Until This Harsh Division Has Been Resolved, Peace In Europe Will Never Be Secure. We Must Turn To One Of The Great Unfinished Tasks Of Our Generationand That Unfinished Task Is Making Europe Whole Again.

This Is A Moment That I Deeply Wish My Parents Could Have Lived To Share. My Father Would Have Enjoyed What You Have So Generously Said Of Me-and My Mother Would Have Believed It.

When Things Haven't Gone Well For You, Call In A Secretary Or A Staff Man And Chew Him Out. You Will Sleep Better And They Will Appreciate The Attention.

A Third Place To Build The Great Society Is In The Classrooms Of America. There Your Children's Lives Will Be Shaped. Our Society Will Not Be Great Until Every Young Mind Is Set Free To Scan The Farthest Reaches Of Thought And Imagination. We Are Still Far From That Goal.

No One Has The Right To Use America's Rivers And America's Waterways, That Belong To All The People. As A Sewer. The Banks Of A River May Belong To One Man Or One Industry Or One State, But The Waters Which Flow Between The Banks Should Belong To All The People.

We Believe, That Is, You And I, That Education Is Not An Expense. We Believe It Is An Investment.

But We Have Not Used Our Waters Well. Our Major Rivers Are Defiled By Noxious Debris. Pollutants From Cities And Industries Kill The Fish In Our Streams. Many Waterways Are Covered With Oil Slicks And Contain Growths Of Algae That Destroy Productive Life And Make The Water Unfit For Recreation. "polluted Water-no Swimming" Has Become A Familiar Sign On Too Many Beaches And Rivers. A Lake That Has Served Many Generations Of Men Now Can Be Destroyed By Man In Less Than One Generation.

Emancipation Was A Proclamation, But Not A Fact.

The Fact That A Man Is A Newspaper Reporter Is Evidence Of Some Flaw Of Character.

Faith Builds, Cynicism Destroys.

We Have The Opportunity To Move Not Only Toward The Rich Society And The Powerful Society, But Upward To The Great Society.

What We Won When All Of Our People United Just Must Not Now Be Lost In Suspicion, Distrust, Selfishness, And Politics Among Any Of Our People. Accordingly, I Shall Not Seek, And I Will Not Accept, The Nomination Of My Party For Another Term As Your President.

As It Was 189 Years Ago, So Today The Cause Of America Is A Revolutionary Cause. And I Am Proud This Morning To Salute You As Fellow Revolutionaries. Neither You Nor I Are Willing To Accept The Tyranny Of Poverty, Nor The Dictatorship Of Ignorance, Nor The Despotism Of Ill Health, Nor The Oppression Of Bias And Prejudice And Bigotry. We Want Change. We Want Progress. We Want It Both Abroad And At Homeand We Aim To Get It.

Bias And Prejudice

Ambition Is An Uncomfortable Companion Many Times. He Creates A Discontent With Present Surroundings And Achievements; He Is Never Satisfied But Always Pressing Forward To Better Things In The Future. Restless, Energetic, Purposeful, It Is Ambition That Makes Of The Creature A Real Man.

The Time Has Come When We Cannot Be So Careless. Unless We Do Better, We May Suffer Through A Stark Emergency Of The Environment. We May Create A Hostile World: A World To Bruise Ourselves Against; A World Of Sprawling Cities, Unplanned Or Badly Planned; A World Whose Water Is Full Of Sludge, Whose Winds Are Full Of Soot; A World Whose Landscape Has Been Totally Neglected, Stripped, Marred, And Wasted. All Of This Need Not Happen If We Choose Well, And Particularly If We Plan Well And If We Act Well.

Such Is The Condition Of Life That Something Is Always Wanting To Happiness. In Youth We Have Warm Hopes, Which Are Soon Blasted By Rashness And Negligence, And Great Designs Which Are Defeated By Inexperience. In Age, We Have Knowledge And Prudence, Without Spirit To Exert, Or Motives To Prompt Them; We Are Able To Plan Schemes, And Regulate Measures, But Have Not Time Remaining To Bring Them To Completion.

We Don't Propose To Sit Here In Our Rocking Chair With Our Hands Folded And Let The Communists Set Up Any Government In The Western Hemisphere.

Every Funeral May Justly Be Considered As A Summons To Prepare For That State Into Which It Shows Us That We Must Some Time Enter; And The Summons Is More Loud And Piercing As The Event Of Which It Warns Us Is At Less Distance. To Neglect At Any Time Preparation For Death Is To Sleep On Our Post At A Siege; But To Omit It In Old Age Is To Sleep At An Attack.

This Nation, This Generation, In This Hour Has Man's First Chance To Build A Great Society, A Place Where The Meaning Of Man's Life Matches The Marvels Of Man's Labor.

Life Is Never Easy. There Is Work To Be Done And Obligations To Be Met - Obligations To Truth, To Justice, And To Liberty.

Inspirational Life

Our Society Is Illuminated By The Spiritual Insights Of The Hebrew Prophets. America And Israel Have A Common Love Of Human Freedom, And They Have A Common Faith In A Democratic Way Of Life. ... Most, If Not All Of You, Have Very Deep Ties With The Land And With The People Of Israel, As I Do; For My Christian Faith Sprang From Yours. The Bible Stories Are Woven Into My Childhood Memories As The Gallant Struggle Of Modem Jews To Be Free Of Persecution Is Also Woven Into Our Souls.

While You're Saving Your Face, You're Losing Your Ass.

Poverty Must Not Be A Bar To Learning And Learning Must Offer An Escape From Poverty.

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