Quotes about strength
page 18

Franklin D. Roosevelt photo

“The forests are the "lungs" of our land, purifying the air and giving fresh strength to our people.”

Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945) 32nd President of the United States

1930s
Context: Forests require many years to mature; consequently the long point of view is necessary if the forests are to be maintained for the good of our country. He who would hold this long point of view must realize the need of subordinating immediate profits for the sake of the future public welfare. … A forest is not solely so many thousand board feet of lumber to be logged when market conditions make it profitable. It is an integral part of our natural land covering, and the most potent factor in maintaining Nature's delicate balance in the organic and inorganic worlds. In his struggle for selfish gain, man has often needlessly tipped the scales so that Nature's balance has been destroyed, and the public welfare has usually been on the short-weighted side. Such public necessities, therefore, must not be destroyed because there is profit for someone in their destruction. The preservation of the forests must be lifted above mere dollars and cents considerations. … The handling of our forests as a continuous, renewable resource means permanent employment and stability to our country life.
The forests are also needed for mitigating extreme climatic fluctuations, holding the soil on the slopes, retaining the moisture in the ground, and controlling the equable flow of water in our streams. The forests are the "lungs" of our land, purifying the air and giving fresh strength to our people. Truly, they make the country more livable.
There is a new awakening to the importance of the forests to the country, and if you foresters remain true to your ideals, the country may confidently trust its most precious heritage to your safe-keeping.

Abd al-Karim Qasim photo

“The Iraqi people consist of brotherly nationalities which have amalgamated in order to defend the existence of the eternal Iraqi Republic. [This is] why we always declare 'long live true Iraqi unity, for in it lies our strength.”

Abd al-Karim Qasim (1914–1963) Prime Minister of Iraq

March, 1959, as quoted in Adeed Dawisha (2009), Iraq: A Political History from Independence to Occupation.

Adolf Galland photo

“To use a fighter as a fighter-bomber when the strength of the fighter arm is inadequate to achieve air superiority is putting the cart before the horse.”

Adolf Galland (1912–1996) German World War II general and fighter pilot

Quoted in "The First and the Last," 1954.
The First and the Last (1954)

Thomas Carlyle photo
Paul Bourget photo
George Holmes Howison photo

“To him, the one Absolute Conscience, in every moral disaster our conscience turns for assured refuge and certain renewal of moral courage and strength. That is the real act and infallible function of Prayer.”

George Holmes Howison (1834–1916) American philosopher

Source: The Limits of Evolution, and Other Essays, Illustrating the Metaphysical Theory of Personal Ideaalism (1905), Appendix B: The System in its Ethical Necessity and its Practical Bearings, p.403

Rosa Parks photo
Jacques Plante photo

“Hockey is an art. It requires speed, precision, and strength like other sports, but it also demands an extraordinary intelligence to develop a logical sequence of movements, a technique which is smooth, graceful and in rhythm with the rest of the game.”

Jacques Plante (1929–1986) Canadian ice hockey player

Quoted in Kevin Shea, "One on One with Jacques Plante," http://www.legendsofhockey.net/html/spot_oneononep197802.htm Legends of Hockey.net (2005-05-24)

Stanley Baldwin photo
Calvin Coolidge photo
Nicolas Chamfort photo
David Fleming photo
Calvin Coolidge photo

“Anybody can reduce taxes, but it is not so easy to stand in the gap and resist the passage of increasing appropriation bills which would make tax reduction impossible. It will be very easy to measure the strength of the attachment to reduced taxation by the power with which increased appropriations are resisted. If at the close of the present session the Congress has kept within the budget which I propose to present, it will then be possible to have a moderate amount of tax reduction and all the tax reform that the Congress may wish for during the next fiscal year. The country is now feeling the direct stimulus which came from the passage of the last revenue bill, and under the assurance of a reasonable system of taxation there is every prospect of an era of prosperity of unprecedented proportions. But it would be idle to expect any such results unless business can continue free from excess profits taxation and be accorded a system of surtaxes at rates which have for their object not the punishment of success or the discouragement of business, but the production of the greatest amount of revenue from large incomes. I am convinced that the larger incomes of the country would actually yield more revenue to the Government if the basis of taxation were scientifically revised downward. Moreover the effect of the present method of this taxation is to increase the cost of interest. on productive enterprise and to increase the burden of rent. It is altogether likely that such reduction would so encourage and stimulate investment that it would firmly establish our country in the economic leadership of the world.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, Second State of the Union Address (1924)

“Fill every beaker up, my men, pour forth the cheering wine:
There’s life and strength in every drop,—thanksgiving to the vine!”

Albert Gorton Greene (1802–1868) American judge

The Baron's last Banquet, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

George Curzon, 1st Marquess Curzon of Kedleston photo

“I believe that the Durbar, more than any event in modern history, showed to the Indian people the path which, under the guidance of Providence, they are treading, taught the Indian Empire its unity, and impressed the world with its moral as well as material force. It will not be forgotten. The sound of the trumpets has already died away; the captains and the kings have departed; but the effect produced by this overwhelmingly display of unity and patriotism is still alive and will not perish. Everywhere it is known that upon the throne of the East is seated a power that has made of the sentiments, the aspirations, and the interests of 300 millions of Asiatics a living thing, and the units in that great aggregation have learned that in their incorporation lies their strength. As a disinterested spectator of the Durbar remarked, Not until to-day did I realise that the destinies of the East still lie, as they always have done, in the hollow of India’s hand. I think, too, that the Durbar taught the lesson not only of power but of duty. There was not an officer of Government there present, there was not a Ruling Prince nor a thoughtful spectator, who must not at one moment or other have felt that participation in so great a conception carried with it responsibility as well as pride, and that he owed something in return for whatever of dignity or security or opportunity the Empire had given him.”

George Curzon, 1st Marquess Curzon of Kedleston (1859–1925) British politician

Budget Speech (25 March 1903), quoted in Lord Curzon in India, Being A Selection from His Speeches as Viceroy & Governor-General of India 1898-1905 (London: Macmillan, 1906), pp. 308-309.

Franklin Pierce photo

“You have summoned me in my weakness. You must sustain me by your strength.”

Franklin Pierce (1804–1869) American politician, 14th President of the United States (in office from 1853 to 1857)

Inaugural Address (4 March 1853).

Phil Ochs photo
Isa Bowman photo

“He had a curiously womanish face, and, in direct contradiction to his real character, there seemed to be little strength in it.”

Isa Bowman (1874–1958) British actress

Page 9.
The Story of Lewis Carroll (1899)

Koenraad Elst photo
Nina Kiriki Hoffman photo
Wassily Kandinsky photo
Fausto Cercignani photo

“Sometimes true tolerance requires an extraordinary strength, which we are often too weak to exercise.”

Fausto Cercignani (1941) Italian scholar, essayist and poet

Examples of self-translation (c. 2004), Quotes - Zitate - Citations - Citazioni

Jimmy Carter photo
George W. Bush photo
André Maurois photo
David Myatt photo
Winston S. Churchill photo
Otto Lilienthal photo
Jean-François Lyotard photo
John Ogilby photo

“Such strength hath Custome in each tender Soul.”

John Ogilby (1600–1676) Scottish academic

The Works of Publius Virgilius Maro (2nd ed. 1654), Virgil's Georgicks

Roberto Bolaño photo
Joseph Conrad photo
Frederick Douglass photo
Margaret Sanger photo
Clement Attlee photo
Joyce Brothers photo
Donald J. Trump photo
Pat Murphy photo
George W. Bush photo
Norman Angell photo
David Orrell photo
Seneca the Younger photo
Anne Brontë photo

“Ah! would but Jupiter restore
The strength I had in days of yore!”

John Conington (1825–1869) British classical scholar

Source: Translations, The Aeneid of Virgil (1866), Book VIII, p. 294

Donald J. Trump photo
Johannes Tauler photo
Naomi Klein photo

“So, if consumers are like roaches, then marketers must forever be dreaming up new concoctions for industrial-strength Raid.”

Naomi Klein (1970) Canadian author and activist

Source: No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies 1999, Chapter One, "No Space"

Anton Chekhov photo

“In one-act pieces there should be only rubbish—that is their strength.”

Anton Chekhov (1860–1904) Russian dramatist, author and physician

Letter to A.S. Suvorin (January 6, 1889)
Letters

Davey Havok photo
François Fénelon photo
Hemu photo
Gregory Scott Paul photo
William Least Heat-Moon photo
Nouri al-Maliki photo

“We pray to God almighty to give us strength so we can meet the ambitious goals of our people, who have suffered a lot.”

Nouri al-Maliki (1950) Prime Minister of Iraq

As quoted in Iraq's new unity government sworn in, CNN, 20 May 2006, 2 December 2011 http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/05/20/iraq.main/index.html,.

Bruce Springsteen photo

“And your strength is devastating in the face of all these odds.
Remember how I kept you waiting when it was my turn to be the god.”

Bruce Springsteen (1949) American singer and songwriter

"For You"
Song lyrics, Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. (1973)

Denis Diderot photo

“To say that man is a compound of strength and weakness, light and darkness, smallness and greatness, is not to indict him, it is to define him.”

Denis Diderot (1713–1784) French Enlightenment philosopher and encyclopædist

As quoted in The Anchor Book of French Quotations with English Translations (1963) by Norbert Gutermam
Pensées Philosophiques (1746)

Gloria Estefan photo
Willem de Sitter photo
Clarence Thomas photo
John of St. Samson photo
Anthony Trollope photo
Barbara Hepworth photo
Amir Taheri photo
John Dryden photo

“Thus all below is strength, and all above is grace.”

John Dryden (1631–1700) English poet and playwright of the XVIIth century

Epistle to Congreve (1693), line 19.

Joseph Goebbels photo

“My God is a God of strength. HE does not like the smell of frankincense and the dishonoring crawl of the crowd. I stand before HIM proudly, with the head held high, as HE created me, and I profess gladly and freely before HIM. The true German seeks God for all of his life.”

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

Mein Gott ist ein Gott der Stärke. Er mag nicht den Weihrauchdampf und das entehrende Kriechen der Menge. Ich stehe vor ihm stolz erhobenen Hauptes, wie er mich erschaffen hat, und bekenne mich freudig und frei vor ihm. Der wahre Deutsche bleibt Zeit seines Lebens ein Gottsucher.
Michael: a German fate in diary notes (1926)

John F. Kennedy photo
Tsunetomo Yamamoto photo
Ilia Chavchavadze photo

“Ah here, O mother is they task,
Thy sacred duty to thy land:
Endow thy sons with spirits strong,
With strength of heart and honor bright;
Inspire them with fraternal love,
To strive for freedom and for right.”

Ilia Chavchavadze (1837–1907) Georgian poet and politician; a saint of Georgian Orthodox Church

Source: Anthology of Georgian Poetry (1948), Lines to a Georgian Mother, p. 59

Asger Jorn photo

“There can be no question of selecting in any direction, but of a penetrating the whole cosmic law of rhythms, forces and material that are the real world, from the ugliest to the most beautiful, everything that has character and expression, from the crudest and most brutal to the gentlest and most delicate; everything that speaks to us in its capacity as life. From this it follows that one must know all in order to be able to express all. It is the abolition of the aesthetic principle. We are not disillusioned because we have no illusions; we have never had any. What we have and what is our strength, is our joy in life; our interest in life, in all its amoral aspects. That is also the basis of our contemporary art. We do not even know the laws of aesthetics. That old idea of selection according to the beauty-principle Beautiful — Ugly, like to ethical Noble — Sinful, is dead for us, for whom the beautiful is also ugly and everything ugly is endowed with beauty. Behind the comedy and the tragedy we find only life's dramas uniting both; not in noble heroes and false villains, but people.”

Asger Jorn (1914–1973) Danish artist

Variant translations:
What we possess and what gives us strength is our joy in life, our interest in life in all its amoral facets. This is also the foundation for today's art. We do not even know the aesthetic laws.
We are not disillusioned because we have no illusions; we have never had any. What we have, and what constitutes our strength, is our joy in life, in all of its moral and amoral manifestations.
1940 - 1948, Intimate Banalities' (1941)

“For a moment hope, bright and cruel as a knife, presented itself to me. It took every ounce of strength I had to turn away.”

Sarah Zettel (1966) American writer

Source: Bitter Angels (2009), Chapter 7 (p. 97)

Winston S. Churchill photo
Alexander Calder photo

“Wire, rods, sheet metal have strength, even in very attenuated forms, and respond quickly to whatever sort of work one may subject them to. Contrasts in mass or weight are feasible, too, according to the gauge, or to the kind of metal used, so that physical laws, as well as aesthetic concepts, can be held to. There is of course a close alliance between physics and aesthetics.”

Alexander Calder (1898–1976) American artist

Quote of Calder (1943) in his essay A Propos of Measuring a Mobile, Calder Foundation; as quoted in Calder and Mondrian: An Unlikely Kinship, senior-thesis by Eva Yonas http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.517.581&rep=rep1&type=pdf, Ohio State University August 2006, Department of Art History, p. 19
1930s - 1950s

Kim Wilde photo
Atal Bihari Vajpayee photo
Thomas Carlyle photo
Ricardo Sanchez photo
Ingmar Bergman photo
Henry George photo
C. V. Raman photo

“The true wealth of a nation consists not in the stored- up gold but in the intellectual and physical strength of its people.”

C. V. Raman (1888–1970) Indian physicist

Quotations by 60 Greatest Indians, Dhirubhai Ambani Institute of Information and Communication Technology http://resourcecentre.daiict.ac.in/eresources/iresources/quotations.html,

Henry Ward Beecher photo
Winston S. Churchill photo
Francois Rabelais photo

“War begun without good provision of money beforehand for going through with it is but as a breathing of strength and blast that will quickly pass away. Coin is the sinews of war.”

Et guerre faicte sans bonne provision d'argent, n'a qu'un souspirail de vigueur. Les nerfz des batailles sont les pecunes.
Source: Gargantua and Pantagruel (1532–1564), Gargantua (1534), Chapter 44.

George W. Bush photo

“As you serve others, you can inspire others. I’ve been inspired by the examples of many selfless servants. Winston Churchill, a leader of courage and resolve, inspired me during my Presidency—and, for that matter, in the post-presidency. Like Churchill, I now paint. Unlike Churchill, the painting isn’t worth much without the signature. In 1941, he gave a speech to the students of his old school during Britain’s most trying times in World War II. It wasn’t too long, and it is well-remembered. Prime Minister Churchill urged, 'Never give in… in nothing, great or small, large or petty. Never give in except to convictions of honor and good sense'. I hope you’ll remember this advice. But there’s a lesser-known passage from that speech that I also want to share with you. 'These are not dark days. These are great days. The greatest our country has ever lived; and we must all thank God that we have been allowed, each of us according to our stations, to play a part in making these days memorable in the history of our race'. When Churchill uttered these words, many had lost hope in Great Britain’s chance for survival against the Nazis. Many doubted the future of freedom. Today, some doubt America’s future, and they say our best days are behind us. I say, given our strengths—one of which is a bright new generation like you—these are not dark days. These are great days.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2010s, 2015, Remarks at the SMU 100th Spring Commencement (May 2015)

Alberto Gonzales photo
Aurangzeb photo

“27 January 1670: During this month of Ramzan abounding in miracles, the Emperor as the promoter of justice and overthrower of mischief, as a knower of truth and destroyer of oppression, as the zephyr of the garden of victory and the reviver of the faith of the Prophet, issued orders for the demolition of the temple situated in Mathura, famous as the Dehra of Kesho Rai. In a short time by the great exertions of his officers, the destruction of this strong foundation of infidelity was accomplished, and on its site a lofty mosque was built at the expenditure of a large sum. This temple of folly was built by that gross idiot Birsingh Deo Bundela. Before his accession to the throne, the Emperor Jahangir was displeased with Shaikh Abul Fazl. This infidel [Birsingh] became a royal favourite by slaying him [Abul Fazl], and after Jahangir’s accession was rewarded for this service with the permission to build the temple, which he did at an expense of thirty-three lakhs of rupees.
Praised be the august God of the faith of Islam, that in the auspicious reign of this destroyer of infidelity and turbulence [Aurangzeb], such a wonderful and seemingly impossible work was successfully accomplished. On seeing this instance of the strength of the Emperor’s faith and the grandeur of his devotion to God, the proud Rajas were stifled, and in amazement they stood like facing the wall. The idols, large and small, set with costly jewels, which had been set up in the temple, were brought to Agra, and buried under the steps of the mosque of the Begam Sahib, in order to be continually trodden upon. The name of Mathura was changed to Islamabad.
17 December 1679: Hafiz Muhammad Amin Khan reported that some of his servants had ascended the hill and found the other side of the pass also deserted; (evidently) the Rana had evacuated Udaipur and fled. On the 4th January/12th Zil. H., the Emperor encamped in the pass. Hasan ‘Ali Khan was sent in pursuit of the infidel. Prince Muhammad ‘Azam and Khan Jahan Bahadur were permitted to view Udaipur. Ruhullah Khan and Ekkataz Khan went to demolish the great temple in front of the Rana’s palace, which was one of the rarest buildings of the age and the chief cause of the destruction of life and property of the despised worshippers. Twenty machator Rajputs [who] were sitting in the temple, vowed to give up their lives; first one of them came out to fight, killed some and was then himself slain, then came out another and so on, until every one of the twenty perished, after killing a large number of the imperialists including the trusted slave, Ikhlas. The temple was found empty. The hewers broke the images.”

Aurangzeb (1618–1707) Sixth Mughal Emperor

Saqi Mustad Khan, Maasir-i-Alamgiri, translated and annotated by Jadunath Sarkar, Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal, Calcutta, 1947, reprinted by Oriental Books Reprint Corporation, Delhi, 1986. quoted in Shourie, Arun (2014). Eminent historians: Their technology, their line, their fraud. Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India : HarperCollins Publishers. Different translation: January, 1670. “In this month of Ramzan, the religious-minded Emperor ordered the demolition of the temple at Mathura known as the Dehra of Keshav Rai. His officers accomplished it in a short time. A grand mosque was built on its site at a vast expenditure. The temple had been built by Bir Singh Dev Bundela, at a cost of 33 lakhs of Rupees. Praised be the God of the great faith of Islam that in the auspicious reign- of this destroyer of infidelity and turbulence, such a marvellous and [seemingly] impossible feat was accomplished. On seeing this [instance of the] strength of the Emperor’s faith and the grandeur of his devotion to God, the Rajahs felt suffocated and they stood in amazement like statues facing the walls. The idols, large and small, set with costly jewels, which had been set up in the temple, were brought to Agra and buried under the steps of the mosque of Jahanara, to be trodden upon continually.”
Quotes from late medieval histories, 1670s

Bouck White photo
Franz Boas photo

“Eugenics should, therefore, not be allowed to deceive us into the belief that we should try to raise a race of supermen, nor that it should be our aim to eliminate all suffering and pain. The attempt to suppress those defective classes whose deficiencies can be proved by rigid methods to be due to hereditary causes, and to prevent unions that will unavoidably lead to the birth of disease-stricken progeny, is the proper field of eugenics. How much can be and should be attempted in this field depends upon the results of careful studies of the law of heredity. Eugenics is not a panacea that will cure human ills, it is rather a dangerous sword that may turn its edge against those who rely on its strength.”

Franz Boas (1858–1942) German-American anthropologist

Eugenics, in The Scientific Monthly, J. McKeen Cattell, ed., Vol. 3, No. 5,(November, 1916) http://books.google.com/books?id=JKLRAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA478&dq=%22not+be+allowed+to+deceive+us+into+the+belief+that+we+should+try+to+raise+a+race%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=T6O1U7SkOtefyASFgIHIDg&ved=0CD0Q6AEwBg#v=onepage&q=%22vol%203%20no%205%22%20november%201916&f=false http://books.google.com/books?id=JKLRAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA478&dq=%22not+be+allowed+to+deceive+us+into+the+belief+that+we+should+try+to+raise+a+race%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=T6O1U7SkOtefyASFgIHIDg&ved=0CD0Q6AEwBg#v=onepage&q=%22not%20be%20allowed%20to%20deceive%20us%20into%20the%20belief%20that%20we%20should%20try%20to%20raise%20a%20race%22&f=false.

Alexander Bogdanov photo

“In the struggle of mankind with the elements, its aim is dominion over nature. Dominion is a relationship of the organizer to the organized. Step by step, mankind acquires control over and conquers nature; this means that step by step it organizes the universe; it organizes the universe for Itself and in its own interests. Such is the meaning and content of the age-long labour of mankind.
Nature resists elementally and blindly with the terrible strength of its dark, chaotic, but innumerable and Infinite army of elements. In order to conquer it, mankind must organize itself into a mighty army. Unconsciously, it has been doing this for centuries by forming working collective, ranging from the small primitive communes of the primordial epoch to the contemporary cooperation of hundreds of millions of people.
If mankind had to organize the universe only with the forces and means given to it by nature, it would not have any advantage over the other living creatures which also fight for survival against the rest of nature. In its labour mankind uses tools, which it takes from the same external nature. This forms the basis of its victories; it is this which long ago provided and continues to provide mankind with a growing superiority over the strongest and most terrible giants of elemental life and which distinguishes it from the rest of nature's kingdom.”

Alexander Bogdanov (1873–1928) Physician, philosopher, writer

Source: Essays in tektology, 1980, p. 1-2.

Homér photo
Theodore L. Cuyler photo
Colin Wilson photo
Woodrow Wilson photo
Wilhelm Liebknecht photo