All good leaders are connectors. They relate well and make people feel confident about themselves and their leader.

One of the most beautiful qualities of true friendship is to understand and to be understood.

Some people will have to be afraid. Those who plunder the nation, deliver injustice, will have to feel scared of me. And I am not afraid of admitting this. Government cannot be so lenient that it forgives them.

A President cannot always be popular.

No man should be in politics unless he would honestly rather not be there.

This President is going to lead us out of this recovery.

When we turn to one another for counsel we reduce the number of our enemies.

I spend a lot of time just, you know, with my girlfriend and my dog. And I mean, we don’t have a lot of furniture in our house, so it’s really simple. And we’re trying to build products for everyone in the world, right. And you don’t want to get isolated to do that.

I have a self-defense mind. I’ve had it all my life.

A strong man doesn’t have to be dominant toward a woman. He doesn’t match his strength against a woman weak with love for him. He matches it against the world.

First, how do we give everyone a fair shot at opportunity and security in this new economy? Second, how do we make technology work for us, and not against us – especially when it comes to solving urgent challenges like climate change? Third, how do we keep America safe and lead the world without becoming its policeman?

President Obama seems completely unaware of how many of the policies he is trying to impose have been tried before, in many times and places around the world, and have failed time and again.

I often say of George Washington that he was one of the few in the whole history of the world who was not carried away by power.

We have an epidemic of insecure people in our society today.

A friend is, as it were, a second self.

Family quarrels are bitter things. They don’t go according to any rules. They’re not like aches or wounds, they’re more like splits in the skin that won’t heal because there’s not enough material.

If you’re going to change things, you have to be with the people who hold the levers.

You know, I look like a woman but I think like a man. And in this world of business, that has helped me a lot. Because by the time they think that I don’t know what’s goin‘ on, I then got the money, and gone.

Many people when they fall in love look for a little haven of refuge from the world, where they can be sure of being admired when they are not admirable, and praised when they are not praiseworthy.

You think that the heads of state only have serious conversations, but they actually often begin really with the weather or, ‚I really like your tie.‘

So then, the relationship of self to other is the complete realization that loving yourself is impossible without loving everything defined as other than yourself.

It is a well-known fact that those people who must want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it… anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job.

He who loves 50 people has 50 woes; he who loves no one has no woes.

But let me tell you, this gender thing is history. You’re looking at a guy who sat down with Margaret Thatcher across the table and talked about serious issues.

I have a hat. It is graceful and feminine and give me a certain dignity, as if I were attending a state funeral or something. Someday I may get up enough courage to wear it, instead of carrying it.

A leader does not deserve the name unless he is willing occasionally to stand alone.

A man may be a fool and not know it, but not if he is married.

Ever has it been that love knows not its own depth until the hour of separation.

Kisses are a better fate than wisdom.

In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.

A revolution can be neither made nor stopped. The only thing that can be done is for one of several of its children to give it a direction by dint of victories.

Managers today have to do more with less, and get better results from limited resources, more than ever before.

He who is not a good servant will not be a good master.

There will be no end to the troubles of states, or of humanity itself, till philosophers become kings in this world, or till those we now call kings and rulers really and truly become philosophers, and political power and philosophy thus come into the same hands.

Never pretend to a love which you do not actually feel, for love is not ours to command.

Friendship… is not something you learn in school. But if you haven’t learned the meaning of friendship, you really haven’t learned anything.

I believe the most solemn duty of the American president is to protect the American people. If America shows uncertainty and weakness in this decade, the world will drift toward tragedy. This will not happen on my watch.

Love is about mutual respect, apart from attraction.

He that hath wife and children hath given hostages to fortune; for they are impediments to great enterprises, either of virtue or mischief.

There is nothing in the world like the devotion of a married woman. It is a thing no married man knows anything about.

A woman can’t be alone. She needs a man. A man and a woman support and strengthen each other. She just can’t do it by herself.

Perfect friendship is the friendship of men who are good, and alike in excellence; for these wish well alike to each other qua good, and they are good in themselves.

Fellow citizens, we cannot escape history. We, of this Congress and this administration, will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance, or insignificance, can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass will light us down in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation.

Kings are not born: they are made by artificial hallucination.

Unless and until you inspire the people, you will not get results. Imposition will never give you the results. Inspiration will always give you the results.

Friendship is a plant of slow growth and must undergo and withstand the shocks of adversity before it is entitled to the appellation.

There is more of good nature than of good sense at the bottom of most marriages.

We have to distrust each other. It is our only defense against betrayal.

My father wasn’t a cruel man. And I loved him. But he was a pretty tough character. His own father was even tougher – one of those Victorians, hard as iron – but my dad was tough enough.

By all means, marry. If you get a good wife, you’ll become happy; if you get a bad one, you’ll become a philosopher.

Good leaders must communicate vision clearly, creatively, and continually. However, the vision doesn’t come alive until the leader models it.

You have to be careful about how much you reveal to people that look up to you so much.

Be slow in choosing a friend, slower in changing.

In terms of the legal matter of creating a contract between two people that’s called marriage, and allowing them to live together with the protection of law, it seems to me is the way we should be moving in this country.

I should like to lie at your feet and die in your arms.

It is most unwise for people in love to marry.

Nothing strengthens authority so much as silence.

As our enemies have found we can reason like men, so now let us show them we can fight like men also.

How marriage ruins a man! It is as demoralizing as cigarettes, and far more expensive.

A wonderful fact to reflect upon, that every human creature is constituted to be that profound secret and mystery to every other.

Men are more easily governed through their vices than through their virtues.