Theodore Roosevelt Quotes

Don't hit at all if it is honorably possible to avoid hitting; but never hit soft.

I don't pity any man who does hard work worth doing. I admire him. I pity the creature who does not work, at whichever end of the social scale he may regard himself as being.

Absence and death are the same - only that in death there is no suffering.

It is only through labor and painful effort, by grim energy and resolute courage, that we move on to better things.

With self-discipline most anything is possible.

The best executive is one who has sense enough to pick good people to do what he wants done, and self-restraint enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it.

No man is justified in doing evil on the ground of expedience.

Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.

To educate a man in mind and not in morals is to educate a menace to society.

No great intellectual thing was ever done by great effort.

Appraisals are where you get together with your team leader and agree what an outstanding member of the team you are, how much your contribution has been valued, what massive potential you have and, in recognition of all this, would you mind having your salary halved.

We can have no '50-50' allegiance in this country. Either a man is an American and nothing else, or he is not an American at all.

Leave it as it is. The ages have been at work on it and man can only mar it.

The reactionary is always willing to take a progressive attitude on any issue that is dead.

People ask the difference between a leader and a boss. The leader leads, and the boss drives.

I care not what others think of what I do, but I care very much about what I think of what I do! That is character!

Wars are, of course, as a rule to be avoided; but they are far better than certain kinds of peace.

The only time you really live fully is from thirty to sixty. The young are slaves to dreams; the old servants of regrets. Only the middle-aged have all their five senses in the keeping of their wits.

Nine-tenths of wisdom is being wise in time.

A man who is good enough to shed his blood for the country is good enough to be given a square deal afterwards.

Believe you can and you're halfway there.

A thorough knowledge of the Bible is worth more than a college education.

To announce that there must be no criticism of the president... is morally treasonable to the American public.

Big jobs usually go to the men who prove their ability to outgrow small ones.

I wish to preach, not the doctrine of ignoble ease, but the doctrine of the strenuous life.

I am only an average man but, by George, I work harder at it than the average man.

Probably the greatest harm done by vast wealth is the harm that we of moderate means do ourselves when we let the vices of envy and hatred enter deep into our own natures.

In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing, the next best thing is the wrong thing, and the worst thing you can do is nothing.

It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed.

The American people abhor a vacuum.

Far and away the best prize that life has to offer is the chance to work hard at work worth doing.

Germany has reduced savagery to a science, and this great war for the victorious peace of justice must go on until the German cancer is cut clean out of the world body.

The pacifist is as surely a traitor to his country and to humanity as is the most brutal wrongdoer.

Freedom from effort in the present merely means that there has been effort stored up in the past.

Every reform movement has a lunatic fringe.

If you could kick the person in the pants responsible for most of your trouble, you wouldn't sit for a month.

A typical vice of American politics is the avoidance of saying anything real on real issues.

When you are asked if you can do a job, tell 'em, 'Certainly I can!' Then get busy and find out how to do it.

The most important single ingredient in the formula of success is knowing how to get along with people.

Order without liberty and liberty without order are equally destructive.

Keep your eyes on the stars, and your feet on the ground.

For unflagging interest and enjoyment, a household of children, if things go reasonably well, certainly all other forms of success and achievement lose their importance by comparison.

The man who loves other countries as much as his own stands on a level with the man who loves other women as much as he loves his own wife.

The one thing I want to leave my children is an honorable name.

The first requisite of a good citizen in this republic of ours is that he shall be able and willing to pull his own weight.

Rhetoric is a poor substitute for action, and we have trusted only to rhetoric. If we are really to be a great nation, we must not merely talk; we must act big.

No man is above the law and no man is below it: nor do we ask any man's permission when we ask him to obey it.

Great thoughts speak only to the thoughtful mind, but great actions speak to all mankind.

No people is wholly civilized where a distinction is drawn between stealing an office and stealing a purse.

When you play, play hard; when you work, don't play at all.