118 Quotes by John W. Gardner

America’s greatness has been the greatness of a free people who shared certain moral commitments. Freedom without moral commitment is aimless and promptly self-destructive.

We get richer and richer in filthier and filthier communities until we reach a final state of affluent misery – crocus on a garbage heap.

The man who once cursed his fate, now curses himself – and pays his psychoanalyst.

If one defines the term ‘dropout’ to mean a person who has given up serious effort to meet his responsibilities, then every business office, government agency, golf club and university faculty would yield its quota.

If the modern leader doesn’t know the facts, he is in grave trouble, but rarely do the facts provide unqualified guidance.

In the artist’s recreation of the world we are enabled to see the world.

In the United States, to an unprecedented degree, the individual’s social role has come to be determined not by who he is but by what he can accomplish.

History never looks like history when you are living through it. It always looks confusing and messy, and it always feels uncomfortable.

The cynic says, 'One man can't do anything.' I say, 'Only one man can do anything.'