To sit back hoping that someday, some way, someone will make things right is to go on feeding the crocodile, hoping he will eat you last – but eat you he will.

Victory belongs to the most persevering.

There is nothing permanent except change.

Nothing recedes like progress.

Loss is nothing else but change, and change is Nature’s delight.

You will never do anything in this world without courage. It is the greatest quality of the mind next to honor.

It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you’ll do things differently.

Why is it that although it takes us years to get into our messes, we expect God to get us out of them in a few days?

A man who has no office to go, to I don’t care who he is, is a trial of which you can have no conception.

There is nothing impossible to him who will try.

It is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it.

Life doesn’t require that we be the best, only that we try our best.

Nothing is more terrible than to see ignorance in action.

I will do this job as long as I feel that I can do it full steam.

What this power is I cannot say; all I know is that it exists and it becomes available only when a man is in that state of mind in which he knows exactly what he wants and is fully determined not to quit until he finds it.

I wanted to write when I was young, but people said it was impossible. Then my parents locked me in a mental institution – they said I was crazy and would never make a living from writing.

We’re going to be OK because of the American people. They have more grit, determination and courage than you can imagine.

I’m telling you there is hope. I have seen it, but it does not come from the governments or corporations. It comes from the people.

I believe that if you show people the problems and you show them the solutions they will be moved to act.

There are a lot of inaccuracies out there when it comes to the SEAL training process. You will see guys carrying logs around on television. They think that the hardest part about being on a SEAL team is getting through that training. The fact of the matter is, if you have a good attitude, that training is fun. I had a blast.

We can take a ‚It was hard to get there.‘ But we ain’t taking no loss. We’re going to win.

You accept that this civilisation could be abolished and life will begin later on after a few thousand years because that is something that has happened in the history of this planet. When you have peace in yourself and accept, then you are calm enough to do something, but if you are carried by despair there is no hope.

If you start by promising what you don’t even have yet, you’ll lose your desire to work towards getting it.

The real danger is not inaction. The real danger is when politicians and CEOs are making it look like action is happening when in fact nothing is being done.

Black or white good parts are hard to come by. A good actor with a good opportunity has a shot; without the opportunity it doesn’t matter how good you are.

Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it.

Cruel leaders are replaced only to have new leaders turn cruel.

With Malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds.

The time is always right to do what is right.

He who waits to do a great deal of good at once will never do anything.

Giving up smoking is the easiest thing in the world. I know because I’ve done it thousands of times.

Play not with paradoxes. That caustic which you handle in order to scorch others may happen to sear your own fingers and make them dead to the quality of things.

When you tell a recruiter that you’re almost 300 pounds and you want to be a SEAL, it doesn’t go too well. I got hung up on a lot.

Today we did what we had to do. They counted on America to be passive. They counted wrong.

No man is worth his salt who is not ready at all times to risk his well-being, to risk his body, to risk his life, in a great cause.

I hope my own children never have to fight a war.

In criticism I will be bold, and as sternly, absolutely just with friend and foe. From this purpose nothing shall turn me.

There is no question that liberals do an impressive job of expressing concern for blacks. But do the intentions expressed in their words match the actual consequences of their deeds?

In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free – honorable alike in that we give and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth.

Fame is like a river, that beareth up things light and swollen, and drowns things weighty and solid.

An ass may bray a good while before he shakes the stars down.

I’ve done everything every fat person ever has. I’ve tried every diet.

The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet.

I started writing at the kitchen table after midnight. It took ten months to finish that first book; I sent it to a publisher and I got some kind of prize, so it was like a dream – I was surprised to find it happening.

If at first you don’t succeed, then skydiving definitely isn’t for you.

Energy, like the biblical grain of the mustard-seed, will remove mountains.

A State without the means of some change is without the means of its conservation.

I’m not the kind of cat that’s going to cut off an ear if I can’t do something.

A revolution is not a bed of roses.

If a person doesn’t change, there’s something really wrong with him.

It is not well to make great changes in old age.

It was something I never expected to – I never expected the book would sell in the first place. I was hoping for a quick and merciful death at the hands of the reviewers.

I wanted to sell a million records, and I sold a million records. I wanted to go platinum; I went platinum. I’ve been working nonstop since I was 15. I don’t even know how to chill out.

The possibilities are numerous once we decide to act and not react.

It is better to risk starving to death then surrender. If you give up on your dreams, what’s left?

Your decision to be, have and do something out of ordinary entails facing difficulties that are out of the ordinary as well. Sometimes your greatest asset is simply your ability to stay with it longer than anyone else.

I believe that when you think of the negative, and you get up discouraged – ‚There’s nothing good in my future‘ – I really believe it almost ties the hands of God. God works where there’s an attitude of faith. I believe faith is all about hope.

If your determination is fixed, I do not counsel you to despair. Few things are impossible to diligence and skill. Great works are performed not by strength, but perseverance.

Be wary of the man who urges an action in which he himself incurs no risk.

Be sure you put your feet in the right place, then stand firm.

He hoped and prayed that there wasn’t an afterlife. Then he realized there was a contradiction involved here and merely hoped that there wasn’t an afterlife.