Theodore Roosevelt

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

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

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

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

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.

Get action. Seize the moment. Man was never intended to become an oyster.

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.

Great thoughts speak only to the thoughtful mind, but great actions speak to all mankind.

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

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.

Courtesy is as much a mark of a gentleman as courage.

The only time you really live fully is from thirty to sixty. The young are slaves to dreams; the old servants of regrets. Only the middle-aged have all their five senses in the keeping of their wits.