"Man is an artifact designed for space travel. He is not designed to remain in his present biologic state any more than a tadpole is designed to remain a tadpole."

Burroughs, William S. on space
3 fans of this quote   

"So cheat your landlord if you can and must, but do not try to shortchange the Muse. It cannot be done. You can't fake quality any more than you can fake a good meal."

Burroughs, William S. on cheating
3 fans of this quote   

"This is a war universe. War all the time. That is its nature. There may be other universes based on all sorts of other principles, but ours seems to be based on war and games."

Burroughs, William S. on universe
8 fans of this quote   

"Virtue is simply happiness, and happiness is a by-product of function. You are happy when you are functioning."

Burroughs, William S. on virtue
6 fans of this quote   

"After a shooting spree, they always want to take the guns away from the people who didn't do it. I sure as hell wouldn't want to live in a society where the only people allowed guns are the police and the military."

Burroughs, William S. on weapons   

"My general theory since 1971 has been that the word is literally a virus, and that it has not been recognized as such because it has achieved a state of relatively stable symbiosis with its human host; that is to say, the word virus (the Other Half) has established itself so firmly as an accepted part of the human organism that it can now sneer at gangster viruses like smallpox and turn them in to the Pasteur Institute."

Burroughs, William S. on words   

"After one look at this planet any visitor from outer space would say I WANT TO SEE THE MANAGER."

Burroughs, William S. on world   

"I feel that any form of so called psychotherapy is strongly contraindicated for addicts. The question Why did you start using narcotics in the first place? should never be asked. It is quite as irrelevant to treatment as it would be to ask a malarial patient why he went to a malarial area."

Burroughs, William S. on addiction
3 fans of this quote   

"Writing prejudicial, off-putting reviews is a precise exercise in applied black magic. The reviewer can draw free-floating disagreeable associations to a book by implying that the book is completely unimportant without saying exactly why, and carefully avoiding any clear images that could capture the reader's full attention."

Burroughs, William S. on criticism   

"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."

Roosevelt, Theodore on decisions
16 fans of this quote   

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

Roosevelt, Theodore on dedication
3 fans of this quote   

This quotation can be viewed in the context of a book

"At sometime in our lives a devil dwells within us, causes heartbreaks, confusion and troubles, then dies."

Roosevelt, Theodore on evil
7 fans of this quote   

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

Roosevelt, Theodore on duty
4 fans of this quote   

"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."

Roosevelt, Theodore on education
5 fans of this quote   

"Freedom from effort in the present merely means that there has been effort stored up in the past."

Roosevelt, Theodore on effort
3 fans of this quote   

"To educate a man in mind and not in morals is to educate a menace to society."

Roosevelt, Theodore on education
12 fans of this quote   

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

Roosevelt, Theodore on effort
6 fans of this quote   

"No man is above the law, and no man is below it."

Roosevelt, Theodore on equality
3 fans of this quote   

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

Roosevelt, Theodore on expediency
4 fans of this quote   

"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."

Roosevelt, Theodore on failure
4 fans of this quote   

"It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed. In this life we get nothing save by effort."

Roosevelt, Theodore on failure
9 fans of this quote   

This quotation can be viewed in the context of a book

"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."

Roosevelt, Theodore on america
9 fans of this quote   

"The American people abhor a vacuum."

Roosevelt, Theodore on america   

"The government is us; we are the government, you and I."

Roosevelt, Theodore on government   

"There is something to be said for government by a great aristocracy which has furnished leaders to the nation in peace and war for generations; even a democrat like myself must admit this. But there is absolutely nothing to be said for government by a plutocracy, for government by men very powerful in certain lines and gifted with the money touch, but with ideals which in their essence are merely those of so many glorified pawnbrokers."

Roosevelt, Theodore on government   

"I think there is only one quality worse than hardness of heart and that is softness of head."

Roosevelt, Theodore on art
3 fans of this quote   

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

Roosevelt, Theodore on ideals and idealism
3 fans of this quote   

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

Roosevelt, Theodore on immigration
6 fans of this quote   

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

Roosevelt, Theodore on labor
8 fans of this quote   

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

Roosevelt, Theodore on law and lawyers   

"People ask the difference between a leader and a boss. The leader works in the open, and the boss in covert. The leader leads, and the boss drives."

Roosevelt, Theodore on leadership
4 fans of this quote   

"The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self restraint to keep from meddling with them while they do it."

Roosevelt, Theodore on leadership   

"It is better to be faithful than famous."

Roosevelt, Theodore on loyalty
12 fans of this quote   

"The men with the muck-rake are often indispensable to the well-being of society, but only if they know when to stop raking the muck."

Roosevelt, Theodore on media   

"All the resources we need are in the mind"

Roosevelt, Theodore on mind   

"The man who makes no mistakes does not usually make anything"

Roosevelt, Theodore on mistakes
10 fans of this quote   

"There can be no fifty-fifty Americanism in this country. There is room here for only 100 % Americanism, only for those who are Americans and nothing else."

Roosevelt, Theodore on multiculturalism   

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

Roosevelt, Theodore on obedience   

"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!"

Roosevelt, Theodore on opinions
12 fans of this quote   

"A man who is good enough to shed his blood for his country is good enough to be given a square deal afterwards. More than that no man is entitled to, and less than that no man shall have."

Roosevelt, Theodore on patriotism
5 fans of this quote