Quotes For Men
A collection of quotes on the topic of for women, for men, man, men.
Best quotes for men
“As usual, there is a great woman behind every idiot.”
“The secret of getting ahead is getting started.”
“Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.”
Ch. IX : Outdoors and Indoors, p. 336; the final statement "quoted by Squire Bill Widener" as well as variants of it, are often misattributed to Roosevelt himself.
Variant: Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
Attributed to Roosevelt in Conquering an Enemy Called Average (1996) by John L. Mason, Nugget # 8 : The Only Place to Start is Where You Are. <!-- The Military Quotation Book, Revised and Expanded: More than 1,200 of the Best Quotations About War, Leadership, Courage, Victory, and Defeat (2002) by James Charlton -->
Variant: Do what you can, with what you've got, where you are.
Context: There are many kinds of success in life worth having. It is exceedingly interesting and attractive to be a successful business man, or railroad man, or farmer, or a successful lawyer or doctor; or a writer, or a President, or a ranchman, or the colonel of a fighting regiment, or to kill grizzly bears and lions. But for unflagging interest and enjoyment, a household of children, if things go reasonably well, certainly makes all other forms of success and achievement lose their importance by comparison. It may be true that he travels farthest who travels alone; but the goal thus reached is not worth reaching. And as for a life deliberately devoted to pleasure as an end — why, the greatest happiness is the happiness that comes as a by-product of striving to do what must be done, even though sorrow is met in the doing. There is a bit of homely philosophy, quoted by Squire Bill Widener, of Widener's Valley, Virginia, which sums up one's duty in life: "Do what you can, with what you've got, where you are."
“Action is the foundational key to all success.”
“Man is not what he thinks he is, he is what he hides.”
“The measure of intelligence is the ability to change.”
Quotes For Men
“Try to become not a man of success, but try rather to become a man of value.”
As quoted by LIFE magazine (2 May 1955)
1950s
Variant: Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.
“The secret to getting ahead is getting started.”
Variant: "I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time." also mentioned as Jack London quote in Ian Fleming book You Only Live Twice (1964), Ch. 21 : Orbit
Source: San Francisco Bulletin in 1916. Also included as an introduction to a compilation of Jack London short stories in 1956.
Source: The Letters of Vincent van Gogh
“Do not pray for an easy life, pray for the strength to endure a difficult one”
“It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed.”
1900s, The Strenuous Life: Essays and Addresses (1900), The Strenuous Life
Context: It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed. In this life we get nothing save by effort. Freedom from effort in the present merely means that there has been stored up effort in the past.
Context: A life of slothful ease, a life of that peace which springs merely from lack either of desire or of power to strive after great things, is as little worthy of a nation as of an individual. [... ] If you are rich and are worth your salt, you will teach your sons that though they may have leisure, it is not to be spent in idleness; for wisely used leisure merely means that those who possess it, being free from the necessity of working for their livelihood, are all the more bound to carry on some kind of non-remunerative work in science, in letters, in art, in exploration, in historical research—work of the type we most need in this country, the successful carrying out of which reflects most honor upon the nation. We do not admire the man of timid peace. We admire the man who embodies victorious effort; the man who never wrongs his neighbor, who is prompt to help a friend, but who has those virile qualities necessary to win in the stern strife of actual life. It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed. In this life we get nothing save by effort. Freedom from effort in the present merely means that there has been stored up effort in the past. A man can be freed from the necessity of work only by the fact that he or his fathers before him have worked to good purpose. If the freedom thus purchased is used aright, and the man still does actual work, though of a different kind, whether as a writer or a general, whether in the field of politics or in the field of exploration and adventure, he shows he deserves his good fortune. But if he treats this period of freedom from the need of actual labor as a period, not of preparation, but of mere enjoyment, even though perhaps not of vicious enjoyment, he shows that he is simply a cumberer of the earth's surface, and he surely unfits himself to hold his own with his fellows if the need to do so should again arise.
“The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.”
Touchstone, Act V, scene i
Source: As You Like It (1599–1600)
“I can accept failure, everyone fails at something. But I can't accept not trying.”
Variant: I can appect failure, but I cannot accept not trying.
“I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.”
Source: You Only Live Twice (1964), Ch. 21 : Orbit. Fleming is quoting Jack London directly.
“Judge a man by his questions rather than by his answers.”
Il est encore plus facile de juger de l'esprit d'un homme par ses questions que par ses réponses. (It is easier to judge the mind of a man by his questions rather than his answers) — Pierre-Marc-Gaston, duc de Lévis (1764-1830), Maximes et réflexions sur différents sujets de morale et de politique (Paris, 1808): Maxim xviii
Misattributed
“The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones.”
Source: Confucius: The Analects
“Man serves the interests of no creature except himself.”
Source: Animal Farm
“It is better to be alone than in bad company.”
Letter to his niece, Harriet Washington (30 October 1791)
1790s
Variant: It is better to offer no excuse than a bad one.
“Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.”
Martin Luther
Misattributed
“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”
This is probably the most quoted statement attributed to Burke, and an extraordinary number of variants of it exist, but all without any definite original source. They closely resemble remarks known to have been made by the Utilitarian philosopher John Stuart Mill, in an address at the University of St. Andrew (1 February 1867) http://books.google.com/books?id=DFNAAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA36&dq=%22Bad+men+need+nothing+more+to+compass+their+ends,+than+that+good+men+should+look+on+and+do+nothing%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=RUh5U6qWBLSysQT0vYGAAw&ved=0CEEQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=%22Bad%20men%20need%20nothing%20more%20to%20compass%20their%20ends%2C%20than%20that%20good%20men%20should%20look%20on%20and%20do%20nothing%22&f=false : Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing. The very extensively used remarks attributed to Burke might be based on a paraphrase of some of his ideas, but he is not known to have ever declared them in so succinct a manner in any of his writings. It has been suggested that they may have been adapted from these lines of Burke's in his Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents http://oll.libertyfund.org/Texts/LFBooks/Burke0061/SelectWorks/HTMLs/0005-01_Pt02_Thoughts.html (1770): "When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle." (see above)
:This purported quote bears a resemblance to the narrated theme of Sergei Bondarchuk's Soviet film adaptation of Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace, produced in 1966. In it the narrator declares "All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing", although since the original is in Russian various translations to English are possible. This purported quote also bears resemblance to a quote widely attributed to Plato, that said "The penalty good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men." It also bears resemblance to what Albert Einstein wrote as part of his tribute to Pablo Casals: "The world is in greater peril from those who tolerate or encourage evil than from those who actually commit it."
: More research done on this matter is available at these two links: Burkequote http://www.tartarus.org/~martin/essays/burkequote.html & Burkequote2 http://www.tartarus.org/~martin/essays/burkequote2.html — as the information at these links indicate, there are many variants of this statement, probably because there is no known original by Burke. In addition, an exhaustive examination of this quote has been done at the following link: QuoteInvestigator http://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/12/04/good-men-do/.
Disputed
Variant: The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing
Source: The Mark of a Man
Source: Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder (2012), p. 156
“Men are born to succeed, not to fail.”
“Men always want to be a woman's first love - women like to be a man's last romance.”
“The average dog is a nicer person than the average person.”
“Knowledge speaks, but wisdom listens”
Variant: Knowledge speaks, but wisdom listens.
“Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.”
Earliest record is in a circular letter from Hessian Church minister Karl Lotz on 5 October 1944 and modified from a quote by Johanan ben Zakai according to [Landes, Richard Allen, Heaven on Earth: The varieties of the millennial experience, USA, Oxford University Press, 2011, 978-0-19-975359-8, https://books.google.com/books?id=seS-0JTykgoC&pg=PA48, 48]
Ref: en.wikiquote.org - Martin Luther / Disputed
Misattributed
“A man can be happy with any woman as long as he does not love her.”
Variant: A man can be happy with any woman, as long as he does not love her.
Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray
“A man who dares to waste one hour of time has not discovered the value of life.”
volume I, chapter VI: "The Voyage", page 266 http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?pageseq=284&itemID=F1452.1&viewtype=image; letter to sister Susan Elizabeth Darwin (4 August 1836)
The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin (1887)
Source: The Life & Letters of Charles Darwin
“It's at the borders of pain and suffering that the men are separated from the boys.”
Attributed in "Citius, Altius, Fortius" ("Swifter, Higher, Stronger"), an unsigned article from Khaleej Times, 8 August 2008 (Galadari Printing and Publishing Co.) http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticleNew.asp?xfile=data/weekend/2008/August/weekend_August25.xml§ion=weekend&col=
“All you need is love. But a little chocolate now and then doesn’t hurt.”
“If there is a good will, there is great way.”
“I like men who have a future and women who have a past.”
Books, When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops? (2004)
Source: When Will Jesus Bring The Pork Chops?
“Men can only be happy when they do not assume that the object of life is happiness.”
“Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be. Be one.”
Μηκέθ᾽ ὅλως περὶ τοῦ οἷόν τινα εἶναι τὸν ἀγαθὸν ἄνδρα διαλέγεσθαι, ἀλλὰ εἶναι τοιοῦτον.
X, 16
Variant: Don't go on discussing what a good person should be. Just be one.
Source: Meditations (c. 121–180 AD), Book X
“Man is a genius when he is dreaming.”
Variant: Man is a genius when he is dreaming.
“Success is getting what you want..
Happiness is wanting what you get.”
Variant: Success is getting what you want. Happiness is wanting what you get.
“For it is in giving that we receive.”
“Love is the condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own.”
"Jubal Harshaw" in the first edition (1961); the later 1991 "Uncut" edition didn't have this line, because it was one Heinlein had added when he went through and trimmed the originally submitted manuscript on which the "Uncut" edition is based. Heinlein also later used a variant of this in The Cat Who Walks Through Walls where he has Xia quote Harshaw: "Dr. Harshaw says that 'the word "love" designates a subjective condition in which the welfare and happiness of another person are essential to one's own happiness.'"
Source: Stranger in a Strange Land (1961; 1991)
“Only put off until tomorrow what you are willing to die having left undone.”
“Man cannot remake himself without suffering, for he is both the marble and the sculptor”
“Where all think alike, no one thinks very much.”
The Stakes of Diplomacy http://books.google.com/books?id=cyFMAAAAMAAJ&q=%22Where+all+think+alike+no+one+thinks+very+much%22&pg=PA51#v=onepage (1915)
“The purpose of life is a life of purpose.”
Jackson, Jim, Walking Together Forever: The Broad Street Bullies, Then and Now
“The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.”
Touchstone, Act V, scene i
Misattributed
“One man with courage makes a majority.”
However, see also the attributed quote "desperate courage makes One a majority."
Attributed to Jackson by Robert F. Kennedy in his "Foreword" to the "Young Readers Memorial Edition" of John F. Kennedy's Profiles in Courage, and by Ronald Reagan in nominating Robert Bork to the US Supreme Court, this has never been found in Jackson's writings, and there is no record of him having declared it. Somewhat similar statements are known to have been made by others:
A man with God is always in the majority. ~ John Knox
Any man more right than his neighbors constitutes a majority of one. ~ Henry David Thoreau
One on God's side is a majority ~ Wendell Phillips
Misattributed
“There are only two forces that unite men — fear and interest.”
Napoleon : In His Own Words (1916)
Context: There are only two forces that unite men — fear and interest. All great revolutions originate in fear, for the play of interests does not lead to accomplishment.
Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray
“The aim of a college education is to teach you to know a good man when you see one.”
Source: I, Candidate for Governor: And How I Got Licked (1935), ; repr. University of California Press, 1994, p. 109.
Context: I used to say to our audiences: "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!"
“I think God, in creating man, somewhat overestimated his ability.”
Variant: I think that God in creating Man somewhat overestimated his ability.
“You never lose by loving, you lose by holding back.”
Variant: You never lose by loving. You always lose by holding back.
Source: Chicken Soup for the Couple's Soul
“Progress is man's ability to complicate simplicity.”
Variant: Progress is a man´s ability to comlicate simplicity.
“It takes a great man to be a good listener.”
“It is part of a good man to do great and noble deeds, though he risk everything.”
“To accomplish great things we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe.”
Variant: To accomplish great things, we must dream as well as act.
Source: Discours de réception, Séance De L'académie Française (introductory speech at a session of the French Academy), 24th December 1896, on Ferdinand de Lesseps' work on the Suez Canal.
Context: To accomplish great things we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe.
“Nothing great in the world was accomplished without passion.”
Often abbreviated to: Nothing great in the World has been accomplished without passion.
Variant translation: We may affirm absolutely that nothing great in the world has ever been accomplished without enthusiasm.
Lectures on the Philosophy of History (1832), Volume 1
Variant: We may affirm absolutely that nothing great in the world has been accomplished without passion.
Context: We assert then that nothing has been accomplished without interest on the part of the actors; and — if interest be called passion, inasmuch as the whole individuality, to the neglect of all other actual or possible interests and claims, is devoted to an object with every fibre of volition, concentrating all its desires and powers upon it — we may affirm absolutely that nothing great in the World has been accomplished without passion.
“Success is getting what you want; happiness is wanting what you get.”
“Education begins the gentleman, but reading, good company and reflection must finish him.”
“Oh dear,' says God, 'I hadn't thought of that,' and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.”
Source: The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
“The greatest deception men suffer is from their own opinions.”
The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), XIX Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
“Most people spend more time and energy going around problems than in trying to solve them.”
“Think where man's glory most begins and ends
And say my glory was I had such friends.”
The Municipal Gallery Revisited http://poetry.poetryx.com/poems/1659/, st. 7
Last Poems (1936-1939)
Variant: Think where man's glory most begins and ends. And say my glory was I had such friends.
Context: You that would judge me, do not judge alone
This book or that, come to this hallowed place
Where my friends' portraits hang and look thereon;
Ireland's history in their lineaments trace;
Think where man's glory most begins and ends
And say my glory was I had such friends.
“Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds.”
Variant: Great ideas often receive violent opposition from mediocre minds.
“Really great people make you feel that you, too, can become great.”
Variant: great people are those who make others feel that they, too, can become great.
“Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp,
Or what's a heaven for?”
"Andrea del Sarto", line 98.
Men and Women (1855)
Source: Men and Women and Other Poems
Jaques, Act II, scene vii.
Variant: All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts.
Source: As You Like It (1599–1600)
“Courtesy is as much a mark of a gentleman as courage.”
“A wise man will make more opportunities, than he finds.”
Of Ceremonies and Respect
Essays (1625)
Variant: Wise men make more opportunities than they find.
Source: The Essays
"Is Life Worth Living?"
Variant: Believe that life is worth living, and your belief will help create the fact.
Source: 1890s, The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy (1897)
“A man should be able to hear, and to bear, the worst that could be said of him.”
“You can judge a man's true character by the way he treats his fellow animals.”
“The real man smiles in trouble, gathers strength from distress, and grows brave by reflection.”
“The secret of success in life is for a man to be ready for his opportunity when it comes.”
“The dog is a gentleman; I hope to go to his heaven not man's.”
“Only a man's character is the real criterion of worth.”
22 August 1944
My Day (1935–1962)
Source: You Learn by Living: Eleven Keys for a More Fulfilling Life
“Without feelings of respect, what is there to distinguish men from beasts?”
“Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.”
Widely attributed to Lincoln, this appears to be derived from Thomas Carlyle's general comment below, but there are similar quotes about Lincoln in his biographies.
Adversity is sometimes hard upon a man; but for one man who can stand prosperity, there are a hundred that will stand adversity.
Thomas Carlyle (1841) On Heroes and Hero Worship.
Any man can stand adversity — only a great man can stand prosperity.
Horatio Alger (1883), Abraham Lincoln: The Backwoods Boy; or, How a Young Rail-Splitter became President
Most people can bear adversity; but if you wish to know what a man really is give him power. This is the supreme test. It is the glory of Lincoln that, having almost absolute power, he never used it except on the side of mercy.
Robert G. Ingersoll (1883), Unity: Freedom, Fellowship and Character in Religion, Volume 11, Number 3, The Exchange Table, True Greatness Exemplified in Abraham Lincoln, by Robert G. Ingersoll (excerpt), Quote Page 55, Column 1 and 2, Chicago, Illinois. ( Google Books Full View https://books.google.com/books?id=JUIrAAAAYAAJ&q=%22man+really%22#v=snippet&)
If you want to discover just what there is in a man — give him power.
Francis Trevelyan Miller (1910), Portrait Life of Lincoln: Life of Abraham Lincoln, the Greatest American
Any man can handle adversity. If you truly want to test a man's character, give him power.
Attributed in the electronic game Infamous
Misattributed
“Every strike brings me closer to the next home run.”
As quoted in Weird Ideas That Work : 11 1/2 practices for promoting, managing, and sustaining innovation (2001) by Robert I. Sutton, p. 95
“The superior man is modest in his speech, but exceeds in his actions.”
Bk. 14, Ch. 29 (p. 208)
Translations, The Confucian Analects
Letter to E.L. Godkin (24 December 1895)
1890s