Guardian Archives

Accuracy

Anonymous

Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

Ambition

Niccolo Machiavelli

Ambition is so powerful a passion in the human breast, that however high we reach we are never satisfied.

Publilius Syrus

If you wish to reach the highest, begin at the lowest.

William Blake

No bird soars too high if he soars with his own wings.

Anger

John Dryden

Beware the fury of a patient man.

Defeat

George Edward Woodberry

Defeat is not the worst of failures.  Not to have tried is the true failure.

Wendell L. Willkie

I would rather lose in a cause that I know some day will triumph than to triumph in a cause that I know some day will fail.

Josephus Daniels

Defeat never comes to any man until he admits it.

Despair

Roger W. Babson

When we are flat on our backs there is no way to look but up.

Destiny

William Jennings Bryan

Destiny is no matter of chance.  It is a matter of choice.

Fault

Plutarch

To find a fault is easy; to do better may be difficult.

Hate

Andre Gide

It is better to be hated for what you are than to be loved for what you are not.

Hope

English proverb

Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.

Ancient proverb

A misty morning does not signify a cloudy day.

Human Nature

Anatole France

It is human nature to think wisely and act foolishly.

Husband

Agatha Christie

An archaeologist is the best husband any woman can have: the older she gets, the more interested he is in her.

Ignorance

Ellen Glasgow

He knows so little and knows it so fluently.

Nicholas Ling

Ignorance is a voluntary misfortune.

Insanity

Oliver Wendell Holmes

Insanity is often the logic of an accurate mind overtaxed.

Past

Anonymous

If we do not learn from the past, we are doomed to repeat it.

Politics

Charles de Gaulle

Politics is too serious a matter to be left to the politicians.

Silence

Austin O'Malley

If you keep your mouth shut you will never put your foot in it.

War

Napoleon Bonaparte

Soldiers usually win the battles and generals get the credit for them.

Harry Emerson Fosdick

The tragedy of war is that it uses man's best to do man's worst.

Georges Clemenceau

I don't know whether war is an interlude during peace, or peace is an interlude during war.