1,051 Quotes by Theodore Roosevelt

Not trying is the surest way of achieving nothing at all.

The Armenian massacre was the greatest crime of the war..

Every thinking man, when he thinks, realizes that the teachings of the Bible are so interwoven and intertwined with our whole civic and social life that it would be literally, I do not mean figuratively, but literally impossible for us to figure what the loss would be if these teachings were removed. We would lose all the standards by which we now judge both public and private morals; all the standards toward which we, with more or less resolution, strive to raise ourselves.

A man's usefulness depends on his living up to his ideals insofar as he can. It is hard to fail but it is worse never to have tried to succeed. All daring and courage, all iron endurance of misfortune, make for a finer, nobler type of manhood. Only those are fit to live who do not fear to die; and none are fit to die who have shrunk from the joy of life and the duty of life.

Where a trust becomes a monopoly the state has an immediate right to interfere.

We shall make mistakes; and if we let these mistakes frighten us from our work we shall show ourselves weaklings.

I took the canal zone and let congress debate, and while the debate goes on the canal does also

The weakling and the coward are out of place in a strong and free community. In a republic like ours the governing class is composed of the strong men who take the trouble to do the work of government; and if you are too timid or too fastidious or too careless to do your part in this work, then you forfeit your right to be considered one of the governing and you become one of the governed insteadone of the driven cattle of the political arena.

I can no more explain why I like "natural history" than why I like California canned peaches; nor why I do not care for that enormous brand of natural history which deals with invertebrates any more than why I do not care for brandied peaches. All I can say is that almost as soon as I began to read at all I began to like to read about the natural history of beasts and birds and the more formidable or interesting reptiles and fishes.