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Greatness quotes

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“Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them.” William Shakespeare, “Twelfth Night” - 1623

“To be great is to be misunderstood.” Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Self-Reliance” - 1841

“The superior man thinks of virtue; the small man thinks of comfort.” Confucius, “Analects”

“But America is too great for small dreams.” Ronald Reagan, “State of the Union Address” - 25 January 1984

“The breaking of so great a thing should make a greater crack: the round world should have shook lions into civil streets, and citizens to their dens.” William Shakespeare, “Antony and Cleopatra” - 1623

“Be great in act, as you have been in thought;” William Shakespeare, “King John” - 1623

“Be not afraid of greatness.” William Shakespeare, “Twelfth Night” - 1623

“Undoubtedly philosophers are in the right, when they tell us that nothing is great or little otherwise than by comparison.” Jonathan Swift, “Gulliver's Travels” - 1726

“No sadder proof can be given by a man of his own littleness than disbelief in great men.” Thomas Carlyle, “On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and The Heroic in History” - 1841

“The greatest minds never realise their ideals in any matter;” Jerome K. Jerome, “Three Men in a Boat” - 1889

“Some men are born great, some achieve greatness, some get it as a graduation gift.” Robin Williams, “Robin Williams Live On Broadway” - 2002

“Not in his speech, not in his thoughts, I see his greatness, only in his actions, in his life.” Hermann Hesse, “Siddhartha” - 1922

“Learn from me, if not by my precepts, at least by my example, how dangerous is the acquirement of knowledge and how much happier that man is who believes his native town to be the world, than he who aspires to become greater than his nature will...” Mary Shelley, “Frankenstein” - 1818

“Madness in great ones must not unwatch'd go.” William Shakespeare, “Hamlet” - 1623

“All great and precious things are lonely.” John Steinbeck, “East of Eden” - 1952

“Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm.” Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Circles” - 1841

“A great man is always willing to be little.” Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Compensation” - 1841

“Greatness inspires envy, envy engenders spite, spite spawns lies.” J. K. Rowling, “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” - 2005

“a book should be sought after even if it has only one great page in it” Henry Miller, “Tropic of Cancer” - 1934

“The whole visible world is only an imperceptible atom in the ample bosom of nature. No idea approaches it.” Blaise Pascal, “Pensées” - 1670

“small erections may be finished by their first architects; grand ones, true ones, ever leave the copestone to posterity. God keep me from ever completing anything.” Herman Melville, “Moby-Dick” - 1851

“The greatness of man is great in that he knows himself to be miserable.” Blaise Pascal, “Pensées” - 1670

“Cheap editions of great books may be delightful, but cheap editions of great men are absolutely detestable.” Oscar Wilde, “Intentions” - 1891

“After all, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named did great things — terrible, yes, but great.” J. K. Rowling, “Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone” - 1997

“It always remains true that if we had been greater, circumstance would have been less strong against us.” George Eliot, “Middlemarch” - 1872

“To make America the greatest is my goal, So I beat the Russians, and I beat the Pole, and for the USA won the Medal of Gold. Italians said, 'You're Greater than the Cassius of Old.'” Muhammad Ali, “The Soul of a Butterfly” - 2004

“He was justifying his existence, than which life can do no greater; for life achieves its summit when it does to the uttermost that which it was equipped to do.” Jack London, “White Fang” - 1906

“It takes two to make a very great career: the man who is great, and the man-almost rarer-who is great enough to see greatness and say so.” Ayn Rand, “The Fountainhead” - 1943

“Anything may be betrayed, anyone may be forgiven. But not those who lack the courage of their own greatness.” Ayn Rand, “The Fountainhead” - 1943

“Remember, you have been given absolute power to bind and to loose, but the greater the power, the more terrible its responsibility.” Fyodor Dostoyevsky, “The Brothers Karamazov” - 1880

“Great souls are always loyally submissive, reverent to what is over them; only small mean souls are otherwise.” Thomas Carlyle, “On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and The Heroic in History” - 1841

“There needs not a great soul to make a hero; there needs a god-created soul which will be true to its origin; that will be a great soul!” Thomas Carlyle, “On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and The Heroic in History” - 1841

“The History of the World, I said already, was the Biography of Great Men.” Thomas Carlyle, “On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and The Heroic in History” - 1841

“But I can't help remembering that the world's great men have not commonly been great scholars, nor its great scholars great men.” Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr., “The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table” - 1858

“It is the mark of a great man that he puts to flight all ordinary calculations. He is at once sublime and touching, childlike and of the race of giants.” Honoré de Balzac, “Letters of Two Brides” - 1841

“No, not one shall be forgotten who was great in the world. But each was great in his own way, and each in proportion to the greatness of that which he loved. For he who loved himself became great by himself, and he who loved other men became...” Søren Kierkegaard, “Fear and Trembling” - 1843

“For it is not what happens to me that makes me great, but it is what I do, and there is surely no one who thinks that a man became great because he won the great prize in the lottery.” Søren Kierkegaard, “Fear and Trembling” - 1843

“We have not seen great things done in our time except by those who have been considered mean; the rest have failed.” Niccolò Machiavelli, “The Prince” - 1532

“Yet such is oft the course of deeds that move the wheels of the world: small hands do them because they must, while the eyes of the great are elsewhere.” J. R. R. Tolkien, “The Fellowship of the Ring” - 1954

“I fear those big words . . . which make us so unhappy.” James Joyce, “Ulysses” - 1922

“Ask yourself whether the dream of heaven and greatness should be left waiting for us in our graves—or whether it should be ours here and now and on this earth.” Ayn Rand, “Atlas Shrugged” - 1957

“Anybody can make history. Only a great man can write it.” Oscar Wilde, “Intentions” - 1891

Related topics

action life God weakness thought soul history circumstance America love madness responsibility strength men death truth fear knowledge speech success

Related authors

William Shakespeare (5)
Thomas Carlyle (4)
Ralph Waldo Emerson (3)
Ayn Rand (3)
Oscar Wilde (2)
J. K. Rowling (2)
Blaise Pascal (2)
Søren Kierkegaard (2)
James Joyce (1)
Herman Melville (1)
George Eliot (1)
Muhammad Ali (1)
Jack London (1)
Jonathan Swift (1)
Confucius (1)
Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1)
Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. (1)
Jerome K. Jerome (1)
Honoré de Balzac (1)
Ronald Reagan (1)

Related sources

On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and The Heroic in History (4)
Twelfth Night (2)
The Fountainhead (2)
Pensées (2)
Fear and Trembling (2)
Intentions (2)
Hamlet (1)
Antony and Cleopatra (1)
King John (1)
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (1)
Moby-Dick (1)
Middlemarch (1)
State of the Union Address (1)
The Soul of a Butterfly (1)
Self-Reliance (1)
White Fang (1)
Gulliver's Travels (1)
Analects (1)
The Brothers Karamazov (1)
The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table (1)