Jon > Jon's Quotes

“Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan 'Press On!' has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race.”
― Calvin Coolidge

“Happiness is not a tangible thing, it’s a byproduct of achievement. Achievement must be made against the possibility of failure, against the risk of defeat. It is no achievement to walk a tightrope laid flat on the floor. Where there is no risk, there can be no pride in achievement and, consequently, no happiness. The only way we can advance is by going forward, individually and collectively, in the spirit of the pioneer. We must take the risks involved in our free enterprise system. This is the only way in the world to economic freedom. There is no other way.”
― Ray Kroc, Grinding It Out: The Making of McDonald's

“There are only two tragedies in life: one is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.”
― Oscar Wilde, Lady Windermere's Fan

“Civilized nations, however, do not use their armies and fleets to open one another's ports to trade. What they use their armies and fleets for, is, when they quarrel, to close one another's ports. ... What protection teaches us, is to do to ourselves in time of peace what enemies seek to do to us in time of war.”
― Henry George, Protection or Free Trade

“Man is the only animal whose desires increase as they are fed; the only animal that is never satisfied.”
― Henry George

“You can't keep snakes in your backyard and expect them only to bite your neighbors. You know, eventually those snakes are going to turn on whoever has them in the backyard.”
― Hillary Rodham Clinton

“It is through art, and through art only, that we can realise our perfection.”
― Oscar Wilde

“What would an ocean be without a monster lurking in the dark? It would be like sleep without dreams.”
― Werner Herzog

“Work is the curse of the drinking classes.”
― Oscar Wilde

“One should either be a work of art, or wear a work of art.”
― Oscar Wilde

“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.”
― C.G. Jung

“If the path before you is clear, you’re probably on someone else’s.”
― Carl Jung

“Change will not come if we wait for some other person, or if we wait for some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.”
― Barack Obama

“I read complex theology, but what interests me most are the simple phrases at the heart of it.”
― David Tibet

“A doctor can bury his mistakes, but an architect can only advise his clients to plant vines.”
― Frank Lloyd Wright

“As we live and as we are, Simplicity - with a capital "S" - is difficult to comprehend nowadays. We are no longer truly simple. We no longer live in simple terms or places. Life is a more complex struggle now. It is now valiant to be simple: a courageous thing to even want to be simple. It is a spiritual thing to comprehend what simplicity means.”
― Frank Lloyd Wright, The Natural House

“study nature, love nature, stay close to nature. It will never fail you.”
― Frank Lloyd Wright

“The thing always happens that you really believe in; and the belief in a thing makes it happen”
― Frank Loyd Wright

“Let no man imagine that he has no influence. Whoever he may be, and wherever he may be placed, the man who thinks becomes a light and a power.”
― Henry George

“I have sworn upon the altar of god, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.”
― Thomas Jefferson

“If you want to find out what a man is to the bottom, give him power. Any man can stand adversity — only a great man can stand prosperity. It is the glory of Abraham Lincoln that he never abused power only on the side of mercy”
― Robert Ingersoll

“The day is short, the work is much, the workers are lazy, the reward is great, and the Master is pressing.”
― Yosef Marcus, Pirkei Avot: Ethics of the Fathers

“Once you make a decision, the universe conspires to make it happen.”
― Ralph Waldo Emerson

“It had long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to things.”
― Leonardo da Vinci

“He that can have patience can have what he will.”
― Benjamin Franklin