
“I don't believe that we all should eat squirrels and craft our own doorknobs.”
On Pod Save America.
This I Believe (1952)
Context: I believe in the honest craft of workmen. Take a look around you. There never were enough bosses to check up on all that work. From Independence Hall to the Grand Coulee Dam, these things were built level and square by craftsmen who were honest in their bones.
“I don't believe that we all should eat squirrels and craft our own doorknobs.”
On Pod Save America.
“I believe that almost all politicians are honest.”
This I Believe (1952)
Context: I believe that almost all politicians are honest. For every bribed alderman there are hundreds of politicians, low paid or not paid at all, doing their level best without thanks or glory to make our system work. If this were not true, we would never have gotten past the thirteen colonies.
“To believe all men honest is folly. To believe none is something worse.”
On why Democrats didn't codify Roe vs Wade, in an interview with CBS https://www.cbsnews.com/news/kamala-harris-roe-v-wade-settled-law/
2022, July 2022
2010s, 2018, A note to readers (2018)
Context: I believe that the pursuit of truth and right ideas through honest debate and rigorous argument is a noble undertaking. I am grateful to have played a small role in the conversations that have helped guide this extraordinary nation’s destiny.
I leave this life with no regrets. It was a wonderful life — full and complete with the great loves and great endeavors that make it worth living. I am sad to leave, but I leave with the knowledge that I lived the life that I intended.
“To believe all men honest would be folly. To believe none so, is something worse.”
Letter to William Eustis http://books.google.com/books?id=S088AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA319 (22 June 1809), published in Writings of John Quincy, Adams (1914), The Macmillan company.
Variant: All men profess honesty as long as they can. To believe all men honest would be folly. To believe none so is something worse.
As quoted in And I Quote : The Definitive Collecton of Quotes, Sayings, and Jokes for the Contemporary Speechmaker (2003) by Ashton Applewhite , Tripp Evans, and Andrew Frothingham.
Original: (de) "Glaubt mir, des Menschen wahrster Wahn
wird ihm im Traume aufgetan:
all' Dichtkunst und Poeterei
ist nichts als Wahrtraumdeuterei."
Source: Quotes from his operas, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Hans Sachs, Act 3, Scene 2