Quotes about doing
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Third State of the Union Address (7 December 1903)
1900s
In jail, Cross-Country Kline to Dove Linkhorn.
Source: A Walk on the Wild Side (1956)
Context: But blow wise to this, buddy, blow wise to this: Never play cards with a man called Doc. Never eat at a place called Mom's. Never sleep with a woman whose troubles are worse than your own. Never let nobody talk you into shaking another man's jolt. And never you cop another man's plea. I've tried 'em all and I know. They don't work. / Life is hard by the yard, son. But you don't have to do it by the yard. By the inch it's a cinch. And money can't buy everything. For example: poverty.
Source: The Cardturner: A Novel about a King, a Queen, and a Joker
“Katczinsky says it is all to do with education - it softens the brain.”
Source: All Quiet on the Western Front
“What a child does when not told what to do is the final indicator of what and who that child is.”
“Sometimes you have to do something unforgivable just to be able to go on living.”
“When goods do not cross borders, soldiers will.”
note: Probably coined by Otto T. Mallery (1881-1956) in his 1943 book Economic Union and Durable Peace (he doesn't attribute it to Bastiat, although Bastiat has written similar ideas)
Source: Ref: en.wikiquote.org - Frédéric Bastiat / Misattributed
https://oll.libertyfund.org/pages/did-bastiat-say-when-goods-don-t-cross-borders-soldiers-will note: Misattributed
“… but it doesn't feel crazy to us.
It feels like what we do.”
Source: Heartbeat
“Always do what's right; this will gratify some and astonish the rest”
“The Service you do for others is the rent you pay for your room here on Earth.”
J'accuse! (1898)
Context: These military tribunals have, decidedly, a most singular idea of justice.
This is the plain truth, Mr. President, and it is terrifying. It will leave an indelible stain on your presidency. I realise that you have no power over this case, that you are limited by the Constitution and your entourage. You have, nonetheless, your duty as a man, which you will recognise and fulfill. As for myself, I have not despaired in the least, of the triumph of right. I repeat with the most vehement conviction: truth is on the march, and nothing will stop it. Today is only the beginning, for it is only today that the positions have become clear: on one side, those who are guilty, who do not want the light to shine forth, on the other, those who seek justice and who will give their lives to attain it. I said it before and I repeat it now: when truth is buried underground, it grows and it builds up so much force that the day it explodes it blasts everything with it. We shall see whether we have been setting ourselves up for the most resounding of disasters, yet to come.
“With which stars do they go on speaking, the rivers that never reach the sea?”
Source: The Book of Questions
Source: Your Best Life Now: 7 Steps to Living at Your Full Potential
“Writing is easy. All you have to do is cross out the wrong words.”
“If it's wrong when they do it, it's wrong when we do it.”
“do not view mountains from the scale of human thought”
“Excellence - Take what you have and do the BEST with it.”
Speech at Kalamazoo, Michigan (27 August 1856) http://www.mrlincolnandfreedom.org/inside.asp?ID=14&subjectID=2, Collected Works 1:391 http://quod.lib.umich.edu/l/lincoln/lincoln2/1:391?rgn=div1;view=fulltext
1850s
Quoted by Maya Angelou (quote reproduced in James L. Conyers, Andrew P. Smallwood, Malcolm X: A Historical Reader, Carolina Academic Press, 2008, p. 181 and Elaine Slivinski Lisandrelli, Maya Angelou: More than a poet, Enslow Publishers, 1996, p. 90)
Attributed
“Do something wonderful, people may imitate it.”
Preface
1910s, The Doctor's Dilemma (1911)
Variant: A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.
Context: Attention and activity lead to mistakes as well as to successes; but a life spent in making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.
As quoted in 1000 Brilliant Achievement Quotes (2004) by David Deford, p. 4
Source: High Adventure
Acknowledgements
Twain does not quote Herodotus here, he only sums up what he believes to have been Herodotus' approach to the writing of history. Nevertheless, this apocryphal statement is now often quoted as being the very words of Herodotus.
A Horse's Tale (1907)
Source: The Road Less Traveled: A New Psychology of Love, Traditional Values, and Spiritual Growth
"In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this responsibility — I welcome it." is one of seven quotes inscribed on the walls at the gravesite of John F. Kennedy at Arlington National Cemetery.
"The energy, the faith, the devotion which we bring to this endeavor will light our country and all who serve it — and the glow from that fire can truly light the world." is one of seven quotes inscribed on the walls at the gravesite of John F. Kennedy at Arlington National Cemetery.
"And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country. My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man." is one of seven quotes inscribed on the walls at the gravesite of John F. Kennedy at Arlington National Cemetery.
It has been reported at various places on the internet that in JFK's Inaugural address, the famous line "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country", was inspired by, or even a direct quotation of the famous and much esteemed writer and poet Khalil Gibran. Gibran in 1925 wrote in Arabic a line that has been translated as:
::Are you a politician asking what your country can do for you or a zealous one asking what you can do for your country?
::If you are the first, then you are a parasite; if the second, then you are an oasis in a desert.
However, this translation of Gibran is one that occurred over a decade after Kennedy's 1961 speech, appearing in A Third Treasury of Kahlil Gibran (1975) edited by Andrew Dib Sherfan, and the translator most likely drew upon Kennedy's famous words in expressing Gibran's prior ideas. For a further discussion regarding the quote see here.
1961, Inaugural Address
Context: In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this responsibility — I welcome it. I do not believe that any of us would exchange places with any other people or any other generation. The energy, the faith, the devotion which we bring to this endeavor will light our country and all who serve it — and the glow from that fire can truly light the world.
And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country.
My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.
Source: The Turning Point (1982), p. 82.
Source: The Tao of Physics: An Exploration of the Parallels between Modern Physics and Eastern Mysticism
Context: At the subatomic level, matter does not exist with certainty at definite places, but rather shows "tendencies to exist," and atomic events do not occur with certainty at definite times and in definite ways, but rather show "tendencies to occur."
“Ask not what you can do for your country. Ask what’s for lunch.”
Source: The Use of Poetry and the Use of Criticism
“I do not exist to impress the world. I exist to live my life in a way that will make me happy.”
Source: Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah
Variant: A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and gets to bed at night, and in between he does what he wants to do.
Source: Thus Spoke Zarathustra
Source: The Spiritual Life (1947), p. 164
Context: Anyone who proposes to do good must not expect people to roll stones out of his way, but must accept his lot calmly if they even roll a few more upon it. A strength which becomes clearer and stronger through its experience of such obstacles is the only strength that can conquer them. Resistance is only a waste of strength.
“Love's mysteries in souls do grow,
But yet the body is his book.”
The Extasy, line 71
Source: The Complete English Poems
“Whatever you do or dream you can do—begin it. Boldness has genius and power and magic in it.”
Source: Deep Blue
“Because a thing seems difficult for you, do not think it impossible for anyone to accomplish.”
Source: The Meditations of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus
Public Address, Blake's Notebook c. 1810
1810s
“Find a job you enjoy doing, and you will never have to work a day in your life.”
“A writer who knows what he is doing isn't doing very much.”
"he once said", quoted by Richard Flanagan, 2005. (Also quoted as: "Any writer who knows what he's doing isn't doing very much.")
Nonfiction works
Source: I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
“What you do every day matters more than what you do once in a while.”
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: On the Heights of Despair (1934)
“The Scoutmaster teaches boys to play the game by doing so himself.”
“Those who can -- do. Those who can't -- teach.”
