Quotes By Theodore Roosevelt

The human body has two ends on it: one to create with and one to sit on. Sometimes people get their ends reversed. When this happens they need a kick in the seat of the pants.

Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.

Leave it as it is. The ages have been at work on it and man can only mar it.

The most important single ingredient in the formula of success is knowing how to get along with people.

It is essential that there should be organization of labor. This is an era of organization. Capital organizes and therefore labor must organize.

Wars are, of course, as a rule to be avoided; but they are far better than certain kinds of peace.

No man is above the law and no man is below it: nor do we ask any man's permission when we ask him to obey it.

The boy who is going to make a great man must not make up his mind merely to overcome a thousand obstacles, but to win in spite of a thousand repulses and defeats.

When they call the roll in the Senate, the Senators do not know whether to answer "Present" or "Not guilty."

Believe you can and you're halfway there.

I took the Canal Zone and let Congress debate; and while the debate goes on, the canal does also.

Far and away the best prize that life has to offer is the chance to work hard at work worth doing.

Freedom from effort in the present merely means that there has been effort stored up in the past.

Nine-tenths of wisdom is being wise in time.

The pacifist is as surely a traitor to his country and to humanity as is the most brutal wrongdoer.

Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far.

Get action. Seize the moment. Man was never intended to become an oyster.

I think there is only one quality worse than hardness of heart and that is softness of head.

To educate a man in mind and not in morals is to educate a menace to society.

No man is worth his salt who is not ready at all times to risk his well-being, to risk his body, to risk his life, in a great cause.

Courtesy is as much a mark of a gentleman as courage.

No people is wholly civilized where a distinction is drawn between stealing an office and stealing a purse.

A vote is like a rifle; its usefulness depends upon the character of the user.

Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.

Appraisals are where you get together with your team leader and agree what an outstanding member of the team you are, how much your contribution has been valued, what massive potential you have and, in recognition of all this, would you mind having your salary halved.

I am only an average man but, by George, I work harder at it than the average man.

The only time you really live fully is from thirty to sixty. The young are slaves to dreams; the old servants of regrets. Only the middle-aged have all their five senses in the keeping of their wits.

No great intellectual thing was ever done by great effort.

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

I am a part of everything that I have read.