Soviet Russia: Some Random Sketches and Impressions (1949)
History as an Art (1954), p. 9
1950s
“Knowledge without action is wastefulness and action without knowledge is foolishness.”
Letters from the Earth (1909)
Source: Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, p. 99, The Marx-Engels Reader
No one can, in case of affairs, abandon the conviction that the future is co-determined by his transactions.
Antimonies
Gesammelte Mathematische Werke (1876)
but adieu to this, till happier times, if I ever shall see them.
Letter to https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/02-06-02-0013#GEWN-02-06-02-0013-fn-0002 Mrs. George William Fairfax (Sally Cary Fairfax) (12 September 1758)
1750s
“Suppose an ass had kicked me, would you have had me bring an action against him?”
Diogenes Laertius
1990
Source: The Mastery of Love (1999), Ch.4 - p.71
1982
“Envisioning without action, is the equivalent of praying without faith.”
Source: The Politics of Reality: Essays in Feminist Theory (1983), p. 60
“Put actions behind your words. Don’t be a talker, be a doer.”
“Balance your thoughts with action.”
If you spend too much time thinking about a thing, you'll never get it done.
Source: Striking Thoughts (2000), p. 43
“All action results from thought, so it is thoughts that matter.”
Excerpts from inaugural address (February 25, 2013)
Napoleon : In His Own Words (1916)
[2005, Stations of Wisdom, World Wisdom, 102, 978-0-94153218-1]
God, Reverential fear and love
Source: Statism and Anarchy (1873)
Never Abandon Your Family
Lyrics, Donda (2021)
“The greatest sense of freedom comes when our actions flow directly from feelings.”
Source: He's Just Not That Into You: The No-Excuses Truth to Understanding Guys
“Each thought, each action in the sunlight of awareness becomes sacred.”
Source: Peace Is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life
“I am not responsible for actions of the imaginary version of me you have inside your head.”
Source: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change
“The path to success is to take massive, determined action.”
Source: Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values
Source: Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience
My Point... And I Do Have One. New York: Bantam Books, 1995
“Men rarely see their own actions as unjustified.”
Source: The Final Empire
Source: Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business
“Belief means nothing without actions”
Source: Does My Head Look Big In This?
Source: The King Must Die (1958)
“I would say act like a man of thought and think like a man of action.”
Je dirais qu'il faut agir en homme de pensée et penser en homme d'action.
Speech at the Descartes Conference http://books.google.com/books?id=BynXAAAAMAAJ&q=%22Je+dirais+qu'il+faut+agir+en+homme+de+pens%C3%A9e+et+penser+en+homme+d'action%22&pg=PA1579#v=onepage in Paris (1937)
Quoted in The Forbes Scrapbook of Thoughts on the Business of Life (1950), p. 442, as "Think like a man of action, act like a man of thought."
Lightsong the Bold
Warbreaker (2009)
Literary Essays, vol. II (1870–1890), Rousseau and the Sentimentalists
“Godliness is more easily feigned in words than in actions”
Source: The Religious Affections
"The Ecological Conscience" [1947]; Published in The River of the Mother of God and Other Essays by Aldo Leopold, Susan L. Flader and J. Baird Callicott (eds.) 1991, p. 346.
1940s
Source: A Sand County Almanac
Context: The direction is clear, and the first step is to throw your weight around on matters of right and wrong in land-use. Cease being intimidated by the argument that a right action is impossible because it does not yield maximum profits, or that a wrong action is to be condoned because it pays. That philosophy is dead in human relations, and its funeral in land-relations is overdue.
Source: Way of the Peaceful Warrior
“Love's action. It isn't talk and it never has been.”
Source: Beach Music
“If one's actions are honest, one does not need the predated confidence of others.”
Source: Atlas Shrugged
Variant: You're going to come across people in your life who will say all the right words at all the right times. But in the end, it's always their actions you should judge them by. It's actions, not words, that matter.
Source: The Rescue
Source: Lover Unleashed
Quoted in "Table Talk" http://books.google.com/books?id=LIxUAAAAcAAJ&q=%22greatest+pleasure+I+know+is+to+do+a+good+action+by+stealth+and+to+have+it+found+out+by+accident%22&pg=PA14#v=onepage in The Athenaeum magazine (4 January 1834).
Source: The Happiness Project: Or Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun
Source: 1890s, The Mountains of California (1894), chapter 5: The Passes <!-- Terry Gifford, EWDB, page 328 -->
Context: Accidents in the mountains are less common than in the lowlands, and these mountain mansions are decent, delightful, even divine, places to die in, compared with the doleful chambers of civilization. Few places in this world are more dangerous than home. Fear not, therefore, to try the mountain-passes. They will kill care, save you from deadly apathy, set you free, and call forth every faculty into vigorous, enthusiastic action. Even the sick should try these so-called dangerous passes, because for every unfortunate they kill, they cure a thousand.
“A single action can cause a life to veer off in a direction it was never meant to go.”
Source: Way of the Peaceful Warrior: A Book That Changes Lives
Source: How to Win Friends and Influence People
“Our challenges don't define us, our actions do.”
Variant: Our challenges don't define us, our actions do
As quoted in The Life and Work of Martha Graham (1991) by Agnes de Mille, p. 264, <!-- de Mille precedes the Graham quotation with: "The greatest thing she ever said to me was in 1943 after the opening of Oklahoma!, when I suddenly had unexpected, flamboyant success for a work I thought was only fairly good, after years of neglect for work I thought was fine. I was bewildered and worried that my entire scale of values was untrustworthy. I talked to Martha. I remember the conversation well. It was in a Schrafft's restaurant over a soda. I confessed that I had a burning desire to be excellent, but no faith that I could be. Martha said to me, very quietly, ... " -->
Context: There is a vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all of time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and it will be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is nor how valuable nor how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open. You do not even have to believe in yourself or your work. You have to keep yourself open and aware to the urges that motivate you. Keep the channel open.... No artist is pleased. [There is] no satisfaction whatever at any time. There is only a queer divine dissatisfaction, a blessed unrest that keeps us marching and makes us more alive than the others.
“When you control a man's thinking you do not have to worry about his actions.”
Preface <!-- p. 21 -->
Source: The Mis-Education of the Negro (1933)
Context: When you control a man's thinking you do not have to worry about his actions. You do not have to tell him not to stand here or go yonder. He will find his "proper place" and will stay in it. You do not need to send him to the back door. He will go without being told. In fact, if there is no back door, he will cut one for his special benefit. His education makes it necessary.
The same educational process which inspires and stimulates the oppressor with the thought that he is everything and has accomplished everything worth while, depresses and crushes at the same time the spark of genius in the Negro by making him feel that his race does not amount to much and never will measure up to the standards of other peoples. The Negro thus educated is a hopeless liability of the race.
Source: Follow the Stars Home
Source: We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves
“His sentences didn't seem to have any verbs, which was par for a politician. All nouns, no action.”
Source: Charlie All Night
Source: The Myth of Freedom and the Way of Meditation
“The smallest of actions is always better than the noblest of intentions.”
Source: The Truth About Forever
Source: Bearing an Hourglass
Source: A Voice Crying in the Wilderness (Vox Clamantis in Deserto) (1990), Ch. 4 : Life and Death and All That p.43
Source: Pedagogy of the Oppressed
Source: The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable
Source: The Summer Tree
Source: The Fruitful Darkness: A Journey Through Buddhist Practice and Tribal Wisdom
