Ambitious Man Quotes

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  Intelligence without ambition is a bird without wings.

  Salvador Dali

  Inspirational, Motivational, Art

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• Poetry and progress are like two ambitious men who hate one another with an instinctive hatred, and when they meet upon the same road, one of them has to give place.

  Charles Baudelaire

  Hate, Men, Two

  Charles Baudelaire, Jonathan Mayne (1981). “Art in Paris 1845-1862: salons and other exhibitions”

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• When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept: Ambition should be made of sterner stuff: Yet Brutus says he was ambitious; And Brutus is an honourable man.

  William Shakespeare

  Ambition, Men, Ambitious

  'Julius Caesar' (1599) act 3, sc. 2, l. [97]

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• 

  It was we, the people; not we, the white male citizens; nor yet we, the male citizens; but we, the whole people, who formed the Union.... Men, their rights and nothing more; women, their rights and nothing less

  Susan B. Anthony

  Strong Women, Equality, White

  Motto of The Revolution (newspaper), 8 Jan. 1868

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• The very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream.

  William Shakespeare

  Inspirational, Dream, Ambition

  William Shakespeare (2001). “Hamlet”, p.155, Classic Books Company

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• Women who seek to be equal with men lack ambition.

  Timothy Leary

  Funny, Hilarious, Girly

  "Third and Possibly the Best 637 Best Things Anybody Ever Said". Book by Robert Byrne, No. 40, 1986.

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• If any ambitious man have a fancy to revolutionize, at one effort, the universal world of human thought, human opinion, and human sentiment.

  Edgar Allan Poe

  Men, Effort, Ambitious

  Edgar Allan Poe, Rufus Wilmot Griswold (1857). “The Works of the Late Edgar Allan Poe”, p.508

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• The tallest Trees are most in the Power of the Winds, and Ambitious Men of the Blasts of Fortune.

  William Penn

  Inspirational, Ambition, Power

  William Penn (1726). “A Collection of the Works of William Penn: To which is Prefixed a Journal of His Life, with Many Original Letters and Papers Not Before Published”, p.849

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• The slave has but one master, the ambitious man has as many as there are persons whose aid may contribute to the advancement of his fortunes.

  Jean de la Bruyere

  Work, Ambition, Men

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• They [i.e. ambitious men] may not cease, but as a dog in a wheel, a bird in a cage, or a squirrel in a chain, so Budaeus compares them; they climb and climb still, with much labour, but never make an end, never at the top.

  Robert Burton

  Dog, Business, Ambition

  "The Anatomy of Melancholy". Book by Robert Burton, 1621.

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• A man's worth is no greater than his ambitions.

  Marcus Aurelius

  Philosophical, Ambition, Men

  27 Copy quote

• Men, their rights, and nothing more; women, their rights, and nothing less.

  Susan B. Anthony

  Witty, Strong Women, Independent

  Motto of The Revolution (newspaper), 8 Jan. 1868

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• If any ambitious man have a fancy to revolutionize, at one effort, the universal world of human thought, human opinion, and human sentiment, the opportunity is his own -- the road to immortal renown lies straight, open, and unencumbered before him. All that he has to do is to write and publish a very little book. Its title should be simple -- a few plain words -- My Heart Laid Bare. But -- this little book must be true to its title.

  Edgar Allan Poe

  Honesty, Lying, Book

  Edgar Allan Poe (2006). “The Portable Edgar Allan Poe”, p.601, Penguin

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• Thinking men cannot be ruled; ambitious men do not stagnate.

  Ayn Rand

  Men, Thinking, Ambitious

  Ayn Rand (1990). “The Voice of Reason: Essays in Objectivist Thought”, p.229, Penguin

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• A man should know about himself two or three things: whether he is a coward; whether he is an honest man or given to lies; whether he is an ambitious man. One should define oneself first of all in those terms, and only then in terms of culture, race, creed.

  Joseph Brodsky

  Lying, Men, Race

  "Joseph Brodsky's Art of Darkness". www.washingtonpost.com. October 23, 1987.

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• But I have noticed this about ambitious men, or men in power, that they fear even the slightest and least likely threat to it.

  Mary Stewart

  Power, Men, Ambitious

  Mary Stewart “The Crystal Cave”

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• Some handsome and ambitious men believe they are above all morality, and a woman's virtue becomes a mere challenge to them.

  William Safire

  Believe, Men, Challenges

  William Safire (2000). “Scandalmonger: A Novel”, p.363, Simon and Schuster

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• For men tied fast to the absolute, bled of their differences, drained of their dreams by authoritarian leeches until nothing but pulp is left, become a massive, sick Thing whose sheer weight is used ruthlessly by ambitious men. Here is the real enemy of the people: our own selves dehumanized into the masses. And where is the David who can slay this giant?

  Lillian Smith

  Dream, Real, Men

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• Ambitious men spend their youth in rendering themselves worthy of patronage; it is their great mistake. While the foolish creatures are laying in stores of knowledge and energy, so that they shall not sink under the weight of responsible posts that recede from them, schemers come and go who are wealthy in words and destitute of ideas, astonish the ignorant, and creep into the confidence of those who have a little knowledge.

  Honore de Balzac

  Success, Mistake, Ambition

  Honore de Balzac (2011). “The Magic Skin: Or The Wild Ass's Skin”, p.99, The Floating Press

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• The ambitious man has never found his true vocation.

  Jiddu Krishnamurti

  Men, Ambitious, Found

  Jiddu Krishnamurti (2005). “Life Ahead: On Learning and the Search for Meaning”, p.77, New World Library

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• When ambitious men find an open passage, they are rather busy than dangerous; and if well watched in their proceedings, they will catch them selves in their own snare, and prepare a way for their own destruction.

  Francis Quarles

  Ambition, Men, Self

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• Vanity is the natural weakness of an ambitious man, which exposes him to the secret scorn and derision of those he converses with, and ruins the character he is so industrious to advance by it.

  Joseph Addison

  Character, Men, Vanity

  Joseph Addison, Richard Hurd, Henry George Bohn (1872). “The Works of the Right Honourable Joseph Addison”, p.158

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• When fortune has been abolished, when every profession is open to everyone, an ambitious man may think it is easy to launch himself on a great career and feel that he has been called to no common destiny. But this is a delusion which experience quickly corrects.

  Alexis de Tocqueville

  Depressing, Destiny, Men

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• When my mouth shall be filled with dust, and the worm shall feed, and feed sweetly upon me, when the ambitious man shall have no satisfaction if the poorest alive tread upon him, nor the poorest receive any contentment in being made equal to princes, for they shall be equal but in dust.

  John Donne

  Men, Dust, Ambitious

  John Donne (2010). “Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions and Death's Duel”, p.176, Cosimo, Inc.

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• Hemans gallows ought to be the fate of all such ambitious men who would involve their country in civil wars, and all the evils in its train that they might reign & ride on its whirlwinds & direct the Storm The free people of these United States have spoken, and consigned these wicked demagogues to their proper doom.

  Andrew Jackson

  Country, War, Fate

  Letter to Andrew I. Crawford, May 1, 1833.

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