Audacity Quotes

• Every great advance in science has issued from a new audacity of imagination.

  John Dewey

  Change, Creativity, Science

  The Quest for Certainty Ch. 11

  96 Copy quote

  Show source

• I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality and freedom for their spirits.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Peace, Freedom, Believe

  Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (2013). “The Essential Martin Luther King, Jr.: "I Have a Dream" and Other Great Writings”, p.117, Beacon Press

  51 Copy quote

  Show source

• Success is the child of audacity.

  Benjamin Disraeli

  Inspirational, Motivational, Success

  Benjamin Disraeli (1866). “Alroy”, p.263

  34 Copy quote

  Show source

• The difference between a vision and a daydream is the audacity to act.

  Steven Furtick

  Differences, Vision, Daydreaming

  23 Copy quote

• Mistakes you commit through audacity are easily corrected with more audacity.

  Paulo Coelho

  Mistake, Advice, Commit

  6 Copy quote

• In every artist there is a touch of audacity without which no talent is conceivable.

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  Artist, Talent

  17 Copy quote

• The first quality that is needed is audacity.

  Winston Churchill

  Inspiring, Quality, Firsts

  Dame Mary Soames, Sir Winston Churchill (1990). “Winston Churchill: His Life as a Painter : a Memoir by His Daughter”, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (HMH)

  13 Copy quote

  Show source

• If you are unsure of a course of action, do not attempt it. Your doubts and hesitations will infect your execution. Timidity is dangerous: Better to enter with boldness. Any mistakes you commit through audacity are easily corrected with more audacity. Everyone admires the bold; no one honors the timid.

  Robert Greene

  Mistake, Honor, Doubt

  Robert Greene (2010). “The 48 Laws Of Power”, p.13, Profile Books

  33 Copy quote

  Show source

• Hope -- Hope in the face of difficulty. Hope in the face of uncertainty. The audacity of hope! In the end, that is God’s greatest gift to us...A belief in things not seen. A belief that there are better days ahead.

  Barack Obama

  Faith, Faces, Belief

  2004 Democratic National Convention Keynote Address, delivered 27 July 2004, Fleet Center, Boston

  111 Copy quote

  Show source

• If the leader is filled with high ambition and if he pursues his aims with audacity and strength of will, he will reach them in spite of all obstacles.

  Carl von Clausewitz

  Leadership, Military, Ambition

  Carl von Clausewitz (2012). “Principles of War”, p.65, Courier Corporation

  22 Copy quote

  Show source

• With audacity one can undertake anything, but not do everything.

  Napoleon Bonaparte

  Courage, Bravery, Risk

  Napoleon Bonaparte “Napoleon in his own words from the French of Jules Bertaut”, Рипол Классик

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• Audacity, more audacity, always audacity.

  Georges Danton

  10 Copy quote

• Audacity augments courage; hesitation, fear.

  Publilius Syrus

  Fear, Risk, Hesitation

  "Sentences". Collection by Publilius Syrus. Maxim 63,

  11 Copy quote

  Show source

• Those who directed the state in the time of Solon and Cleisthenes did not establish a polity which ... trained the citizens in such fashion that they looked upon insolence as democracy, lawlessness as liberty, impudence of speech as equality, and licence to do what they pleased as happiness, but rather a polity which detested and punished such men and by so doing made all the citizens better and wiser.

  Isocrates

  Freedom, Equality, Rights

  126 Copy quote

• Fear created gods; audacity created kings.

  Prosper Jolyot de Crebillon

  Kings

  12 Copy quote

• The great characteristic of men of active genius is a sublime self-confidence, springing not from self-conceit, but from an intense identification of the man with his object, which lifts him altogether above the fear of danger and death, which gives to his enterprise a character of insanity to the common eye, and which communicates an almost superhuman audacity to his will.

  Edwin Percy Whipple

  Character, Eye, Self Confidence

  Edwin Percy Whipple (1851). “Literature and life, lects”, p.87

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• Never forget that no military leader has ever become great without audacity.

  Carl von Clausewitz

  Courage, Military, War

  Carl von Clausewitz (2012). “Principles of War”, p.14, Courier Corporation

  17 Copy quote

  Show source

• The method of the enterprising is to plan with audacity and execute with vigor.

  Christian Nestell Bovee

  Vitality, Vigor, Planning

  10 Copy quote

• There's a fine line between audacity and idiocy.

  Jim Butcher

  Lines, Fine, Idiocy

  Jim Butcher (2009). “Turn Coat: A Novel of the Dresden Files”, p.156, Penguin

  3 Copy quote

  Show source

• Given the same amount of intelligence, timidity will do a thousand times more damage than audacity

  Carl von Clausewitz

  Military, Damage, Given

  Carl von Clausewitz (2008). “On War”, p.191, Princeton University Press

  21 Copy quote

  Show source

• Tact in audacity is knowing how far you can go without going too far.

  Jean Cocteau

  Knowing, Courtesy, Manners

  "Le Coq et l'Arlequin". Essay by Jean Cocteau, 1918.

  9 Copy quote

  Show source

• I still believe that one day mankind will bow before the altars of God and be crowned triumphant over war and bloodshed, and nonviolent redemptive goodwill will proclaim the rule of the land.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  War, Believe, Land

  Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (2013). “The Essential Martin Luther King, Jr.: "I Have a Dream" and Other Great Writings”, p.117, Beacon Press

  13 Copy quote

  Show source

• Such is the audacity of man, that he hath learned to counterfeit Nature, yea, and is so bold as to challenge her in her work.

  Pliny the Elder

  Men, Challenges, Eco

  Pliny (the Elder.) (1964). “The History of the World: Commonly Called The Natural History of C. Plinius Secundus, Or Pliny”

  27 Copy quote

  Show source

• In the wake of 9/11, my meetings with Arab and Pakistani Americans, for example, have a more urgent quality, for the stories of detentions and FBI questioning and hard stares from neighbors have shaken their sense of security and belonging. They have been reminded that the history of immigration in this country has a dark underbelly; they need specific reassurances that their citizenship really means something, that America has learned the right lessons from the Japanese internments during World War II, and that I will stand with them should the political winds shift in an ugly direction.

  Barack Obama

  Country, War, Mean

  178 Copy quote

• Fear made the gods; audacity has made kings.
  [Fr., La crainte fit les dieux; l'audace a fait les rois.]

  Prosper Jolyot de Crebillon

  Kings, Roi, Fit

  6 Copy quote