Woodrow Wilson Quotes

“I have come slowly into possession of such powers as I have. I receive the opinions of my day. I do not conceive them. But I receive them into a vivid mind.”

“America was established not to create wealth but to realize a vision, to realize an ideal - to discover and maintain liberty among men.”

“There is such a thing as a man being too proud to fight.”

“No government has ever been beneficent when the attitude of government was that it was taking care of the people. The only freedom consists in the people taking care of the government.”

“I had rather have everybody on my side than be armed to the teeth.”

“We came to America, either ourselves or in the persons of our ancestors, to better the ideals of men, to make them see finer things than they had seen before, to get rid of the things that divide and to make sure of the things that unite.”

“The man who disparages music as a luxury and non-essential is doing the nation an injury. Music now, more than ever before, is a national need.”

“We are provincials no longer. The tragic events of the 30 months of vital turmoil through which we have just passed have made us citizens of the world. There can be no turning back.”

“We have beaten the living, but we cannot fight the dead.”

“If a dog will not come to you after having looked you in the face, you should go home and examine your conscience.”

“There will be no greater burden on our generation than to organize the forces of liberty in our time in order to make our quest ofa new freedom for America.”

“Every great man of business has got somewhere a touch of the idealist in him.”

“Prosperity is necessarily the first theme of a political campaign.”

“The treasury of America lies in those ambitions, those energies, that cannot be restricted to a special favored class. It depends upon the inventions of unknown men, upon the originations of unknown men, upon the ambitions of unknown men. Every country is renewed out of the ranks of the unknown, not out of the ranks of those already famous and powerful and in control.”

“To conquer with arms is to make only a temporary conquest; to conquer the world by earning its esteem is to make a permanent conquest.”

“Such a mind we must desire to see in a woman,--a mind that stirs without irritating you, that arouses but does not belabour, amuses and yet subtly instructs.”

“The profession I chose was politics; the profession I entered was law. I entered the one because I thought it would lead to the other.”

“America is not a mere body of traders; it is a body of free men. Our greatness is built upon our freedom - is moral, not material. We have a great ardor for gain; but we have a deep passion for the rights of man.”

“The roll of honor consists of the names of meant who have squared their conduct by ideals of duty.”

“Caution is the confidential agent of selfishness.”

“Since trade ignores national boundaries and the manufacturer insists on having the world as a market, the flag of his nation must follow him, and the doors of the nations which are closed against him must be battered down. Concessions obtained by financiers must be safeguarded by ministers of state, even if the sovereignty of unwilling nations be outraged in the process. Colonies must be obtained or planted, in order that no useful corner of the world may be overlooked or left unused.”

“While we are fighting for freedom, we must see, among other things, that labor is free.”

“Just what is it that America stands for? If she stands for one thing more than another it is for the sovereignty of self-governing people.”

“A man has deprived himself of the best there is in the world who has deprived himself of this.”

“There is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they had better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it.”