Quotes By Theodore Roosevelt

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

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

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.

Character, in the long run, is the decisive factor in the life of an individual and of nations alike.

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.

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!

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

A typical vice of American politics is the avoidance of saying anything real on real issues.

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

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

The first requisite of a good citizen in this republic of ours is that he shall be able and willing to pull his own weight.

Probably the greatest harm done by vast wealth is the harm that we of moderate means do ourselves when we let the vices of envy and hatred enter deep into our own natures.

With self-discipline most anything is possible.

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

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

Old age is like everything else. To make a success of it, you've got to start young.

It is only through labor and painful effort, by grim energy and resolute courage, that we move on to better things.

When you are asked if you can do a job, tell 'em, 'Certainly I can!' Then get busy and find out how to do it.

It is difficult to make our material condition better by the best law, but it is easy enough to ruin it by bad laws.

Order without liberty and liberty without order are equally destructive.

Big jobs usually go to the men who prove their ability to outgrow small ones.

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

Never throughout history has a man who lived a life of ease left a name worth remembering.

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

I don't pity any man who does hard work worth doing. I admire him. I pity the creature who does not work, at whichever end of the social scale he may regard himself as being.

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