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“Give us grace and strength to forbear and to persevere. Give us courage and gaiety and the quiet mind, spare to us our friends, soften to us our enemies.”

Robert Louis Stevenson (1850–1894) Scottish novelist, poet, essayist, and travel writer

Prayer, inscribed on the bronze memorial to Stevenson in St. Giles Cathedral, Edinburgh, Scotland

“Yes I will come for you. Roll my strength into a ball for you. Throw myself across chance for you. I will be the bridge or the pulley because you are the dream.”

Jeanette Winterson book The World and Other Places

The World and Other Places (1998)

“I shall defend this pact with all my strength, and if Fascism does not follow me in collaboration with the Socialists, at least no one can force me to follow Fascism.”

Benito Mussolini (1883–1945) Duce and President of the Council of Ministers of Italy. Leader of the National Fascist Party and subsequen…

As quoted in Italy: A Modern History, Denis Mack Smith, University of Michigan Press (1959) p. 352, Pact of Pacification, 1921
1920s

“Production that is essentially completed, which no longer requires strength, ability, inventiveness, entrepreneurship and brilliance (e.g., the transportation system, trusts, conglomerates) will be brought back to state ownership.”

Joseph Goebbels (1897–1945) Nazi politician and Propaganda Minister

Der Nazi-Sozi https://research.calvin.edu/german-propaganda-archive/nazi-sozi.htm, Elberfeld: Verlag der Nationalsozialistischen Briefe (1927) <br class="br">1920s

“Our most important asset and our greatest wealth is strength of mind, intention and will, perseverance, determination and commitment to what we seek and to what we want to achieve.”

Titon Rahmawan

“I believe that we have learned the importance of maintaining military strength as a means of preventing war. We have found that a sound military system is necessary in time of peace if we are to remain at peace. Aggressors in the past, relying on our apparent lack of military force, have unwisely precipitated war. Although they have been led to destruction by their misconception of our strength, we have paid a terrible price for our unpreparedness.”

Harry Truman (1884–1972) American politician, 33rd president of the United States (in office from 1945 to 1953)

Special Message to the Congress on the Threat to the Freedom of Europe (1948)

“In a frenzy, kicking his legs and moving his arms in a swimmer's breaststroke, he managed to fight toward the rod. The closer he got to it, the stronger the web of force became. He did not give up. If he did, he would be back where he had been and without enough strength to begin fighting again. It was not his nature to give up until all his strength had been expended.”

Philip José Farmer (1918–2009) American science fiction writer

Source: The Riverworld series, To Your Scattered Bodies Go (1971), Chapter 1 (p. 4)

“Each spiritual age expresses its special character in a form which corresponds exactly to its character. Each age in this way characterizes its true 'physiognomy', full of expression and strength. Thus in all spiritual areas 'yesterday' is transformed into 'today'. But apart from this, art possesses a further quality which it alone possesses: that quality which enables one to divine the 'tomorrow' today – a strength which is both creative and prophetic.”

Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) Russian painter

Kandinsky's last theoretical statement (Paris, 1942); in Kandinsky, Frank Whitford, Paul Hamlyn Ltd, London 1967, p. 38
1930 - 1944

“You may observe yourself...what a difference there is between the true strength of this nation and the fictitious one of the Whigs. How much time, how many lucky incidents, how many strains of power, how much money must go to create a majority of the latter; on the other hand, take but off the opinion that the Crown is another way inclined, the church interest rises with redoubled force, and by its natural genuine strength.”

Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke (1678–1751) English politician and Viscount

Letter to Mr. Drummond (10 November 1710), quoted in Gilbert Parke, Letters and Correspondence, Public and Private, of The Right Honourable Henry St. John, Lord Visc. Bolingbroke; during the Time he was Secretary of State to Queen Anne; with State Papers, Explanatory Notes, and a Translation of the Foreign Letters, &c.: Vol. I (1798), pp. 16–17

“It is good to love many things, for therein lies the true strength, and whosoever loves much performs much, and can accomplish much, and what is done in love is well done.”

Vincent Van Gogh (1853–1890) Dutch post-Impressionist painter (1853-1890)

Quote of Vincent's letter to Theo, from Amsterdam, 3 April 1878; a cited in The Letters of Vincent van Gogh to his Brother, 1872-1886 (1927) Constable & Co
Variant: Love many things, for therein lies the true strength, and whosoever loves much performs much, and can accomplish much, and what is done in love is done well.
As quoted in Wisdom for the Soul : Five Millennia of Prescriptions for Spiritual Healing (2006) by Larry Chang, p. 483
1870s
Context: If only we try to live sincerely, it will go well with us, even though we are certain to experience real sorrow, and great disappointments, and also will probably commit great faults and do wrong things, but it certainly is true, that it is better to be high-spirited, even though one makes more mistakes, than to be narrow-minded and all too prudent. It is good to love many things, for therein lies the true strength, and whosoever loves much performs much, and can accomplish much, and what is done in love, is well done.