Jim Bouton's Quotes

Entire generations of Americans have come of age since the ancient time when the president's power was constrained by a duty of candor to the American people.

I was amazed at how easy it was for the Clinton Administration to basically cover what they did at Waco in the fog of lies and avoid any responsibility for it.

It has been surprising to me that so few conservatives have voiced concern over the precedence that are being set in favor of suppression by this so-called conservative administration.

Some politicians are aware of the Bill of Rights. It seems that the opposition party is far more likely to invoke it, to wave it in the air, this is what we saw from a lot of republicans during the Clinton Administration, and we are seeing the same from Democrats under Bush.

The more expansive government is, the more perils people face in daily lives, be it from IRS agents or from child support services, or from other agencies that often have little or no legal restraints on their power.

Enthusiasm is the inspiration of everything great. Without it no man is to be feared, and with it none despised.

In politics, merit is rewarded by the possessor being raised, like a target, to a position to be fired at.

It is ever the invisible that is the object of our profoundest worship. With the lover it is not the seen but the unseen that he muses upon.

Living with a saint is more grueling than being one.

Many children, many cares; no children, no felicity.

Partial culture runs to the ornate, extreme culture to simplicity.

The body of a sensualist is the coffin of a dead soul.

The great artist is a slave to his ideals.

The method of the enterprising is to plan with audacity and execute with vigor.

The passions are like fire, useful in a thousand ways and dangerous only in one, through their excess.

They are the weakest, however strong, who have no faith in themselves or their own powers.

Tranquil pleasures last the longest; we are not fitted to bear the burden of great joys.

We trifle when we assign limits to our desires, since nature hath set none.

Wine is a treacherous friend who you must always be on guard for.

The grandest of all laws is the law of progressive development. Under it, in the wide sweep of things, men grow wiser as they grow older, and societies better.

In ambition, as in love, the successful can afford to be indulgent toward their rivals. The prize our own, it is graceful to recognize the merit that vainly aspired to it.

Sensitiveness is closely allied to egotism; and excessive sensibility is only another name for morbid self-consciousness. The cure for tender sensibilities is to make more of our objects and less of our selves.

False friends are like our shadow, keeping close to us while we walk in the sunshine, but leaving us the instant we cross into the shade.

Doubt whom you will, but never yourself.

Our first and last love is self-love.

No man is happy without a delusion of some kind. Delusions are as necessary to our happiness as realities.

We fear things in proportion to our ignorance of them.

Music is the fourth great material want, first food, then clothes, then shelter, then music.

It is the passion that is in a kiss that gives to it its sweetness; it is the affection in a kiss that sanctifies it.

There is great beauty in going through life without anxiety or fear. Half our fears are baseless, and the other half discreditable.

Heaven lent you a soul, Earth will lend a grave.

A failure establishes only this, that our determination to succeed was not strong enough.

Courage enlarges, cowardice diminishes resources. In desperate straits the fears of the timid aggravate the dangers that imperil the brave.

When all else is lost, the future still remains.

Good men have the fewest fears. He has but one great fear who fears to do wrong; he has a thousand who has overcome it.

Panic is a sudden desertion of us, and a going over to the enemy of our imagination.

A sound discretion is not so much indicated by never making a mistake as by never repeating it.

Tearless grief bleeds inwardly.

Next to being witty, the best thing is being able to quote another's wit.

Tears are nature's lotion for the eyes. The eyes see better for being washed by them.

Example has more followers than reason. We unconsciously imitate what pleases us, and approximate to the characters we most admire.

Fame - a few words upon a tombstone, and the truth of those not to be depended on.

Genius makes its observations in short-hand; talent writes them out at length.

The small courtesies sweeten life; the greater ennoble it.

We make way for the man who boldly pushes past us.

As threshing separates the wheat from the chaff, so does affliction purify virtue.

Earth took her shining station as a star, In Heaven's dark hall, high up the crowd of worlds.