Theodore Roosevelt's Quotes

The most practical kind of politics is the politics of decency.

I think there is only one quality worse than hardness of heart and that is softness of head.

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

Some men can live up to their loftiest ideals without ever going higher than a basement.

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

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

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

Every reform movement has a lunatic fringe.

The most successful politician is he who says what the people are thinking most often in the loudest voice.

Order without liberty and liberty without order are equally destructive.

There has never yet been a man in our history who led a life of ease whose name is worth remembering.

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

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

The unforgivable crime is soft hitting. Do not hit at all if it can be avoided; but never hit softly.

I am a part of everything that I have read.

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

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

I took the Canal Zone and let Congress debate; and while the debate goes on, the canal does also.

No great intellectual thing was ever done by great effort.

Obedience of the law is demanded; not asked as a favor.

The American people abhor a vacuum.

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.

The boy who is going to make a great man must not make up his mind merely to overcome a thousand obstacles, but to win in spite of a thousand repulses and defeats.

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

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.

The human body has two ends on it: one to create with and one to sit on. Sometimes people get their ends reversed. When this happens they need a kick in the seat of the pants.

It behooves every man to remember that the work of the critic is of altogether secondary importance, and that, in the end, progress is accomplished by the man who does things.

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.

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.

If there is not the war, you don't get the great general; if there is not a great occasion, you don't get a great statesman; if Lincoln had lived in a time of peace, no one would have known his name.

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.

Believe you can and you're halfway there.

Far better is it to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure... than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much, because they live in a gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat.

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.

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

Every immigrant who comes here should be required within five years to learn English or leave the country.

The things that will destroy America are prosperity-at-any-price, peace-at-any-price, safety-first instead of duty-first, the love of soft living, and the get-rich-quick theory of life.

A vote is like a rifle; its usefulness depends upon the character of the user.

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

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!

Nobody cares how much you know, until they know how much you care.

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

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

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

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

When they call the roll in the Senate, the Senators do not know whether to answer 'Present' or 'Not guilty.'

Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.

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

With self-discipline most anything is possible.

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

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

Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far.

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

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.

A man who has never gone to school may steal from a freight car; but if he has a university education, he may steal the whole railroad.