James A. Garfield Quotes

“A pound of pluck is worth a ton of luck.”

“Be fit for more than the thing you are now doing. Let everyone know that you have a reserve in yourself; that you have more power than you are now using. If you are not too large for the place you occupy, you are too small for it.”

“I am trying to do two things: dare to be a radical and not be a fool, which, if I may judge by the exhibitions around me, is a matter of no small difficulty.”

“I have had many troubles, but the worst of them never came.”

“I love agitation and investigation and glory in defending unpopular truth against popular error.”

“I must do something to keep my thoughts fresh and growing. I dread nothing so much as falling into a rut and feeling myself becoming a fossil.”

“If the power to do hard work is not a skill, it’s the best possible substitute for it.”

“Nine times out of ten the best thing that can happen to a young man is to be tossed overboard and compelled to sink or swim.”

“Nobody but radicals have ever accomplished anything in a great crisis.”

“The chief duty of government is to keep the peace and stand out of the sunshine of the people.”

“The lesson of history is rarely learned by the actors themselves.”

“The men who succeed best in public life are those who take the risk of standing by their own convictions.”

“The worst days of darkness through which I have ever passed have been greatly alleviated by throwing myself with all my energy into some work relating to others.”

“Things don’t turn up in this world until somebody turns them up.”