Louis L'Amour Quotes

It is not enough to do, one must also become. I wish to be wiser, stronger, better. This--" I held out my hands "--this thing that is me is incomplete. It is only the raw material with which I have to work. I want to make it better than I received it.

Politics is the art of making civilization work.

But even the law cannot be in your bedroom at night.

Out here you better have a gun, and a gun in the wagon ain't good for nothin'. I believe what the old Quaker said, 'Trust in the Lord, but keep your powder dry.

Once you have read a book you care about, some part of it is always with you.

A mistake constantly made by those who should know better is to judge people of the past by our standards rather than their own. The only way men or women can be judged is against the canvas of their own time.

The way I see it, every time a man gets up in the morning he starts his life over. Sure, the bills are there to pay, and the job is there to do, but you don't have to stay in a pattern. You can always start over, saddle a fresh horse and take another trail.

Books are the building blocks of civilization, for without the written word, a man knows nothing beyond what occurs during his own brief years and, perhaps, in a few tales his parents tell him.

Even those who fancy themselves the most progressive will fight against other kinds of progress, for each of us is convinced that our way is the best way.

My lady had the body of a siren, the face of a goddess, and the mind of an Armenian camel dealer.

It is better to have no emotion when it is work. Do what needs to be done, and do it coolly.

Living a life is much like climbing mountains-the summits are always further off than you think, but when a man has a goal, he always feels he's working toward something.

Few of us ever live in the present. We are forever anticipating what is to come or remembering what has gone.

There will come a time when you believe everything is finished. That will be the beginning.

Books are the building blocks of civilization and a people without books are a people without history, a people with no story older than the tales of the oldest man or woman.

No man ever raised a monument to a cynic or wrote a poem about a man without faith.

Have faith in God but keep your powder dry.

Much of command is the ability to take command.

Adventure is just a romantic name for trouble. It sounds swell when you write about it, but it's hell when you meet it face to face in a dark and lonely place.

A man can lose sight of everything else when he's bent on revenge, and it ain't worth it.

The only way men or women can be judged is against the canvas of their own time.

... we must read, not only for what we read but for what it makes us think.

Knowledge was not meant to be locked behind doors. It breathes best in the open air where all men can inhale its essence.

One who returns to a place sees it with new eyes. Although the place may not have changed, the viewer inevitably has. For the first time things invisible before become suddenly visible.

No memory is ever alone; it's at the end of a trail of memories, a dozen trails that each have their own associations.

Some say opportunity knocks only once, that is not true. Opportunity knocks all the time, but you have to be ready for it. If the chance comes, you must have the equipment to take advantage of it.

A ship does not sail with yesterday's wind.

When you go to a country, you must learn how to say two things: how to ask for food, and to tell a woman that you love her. Of these the second is more important, for if you tell a woman you love her, she will certainly feed you.

A man can learn a lot if he listens, and if I didn't learn anything else I was learning how much I didn't know.

Nobody got anywhere in this world by simply being content.

Men strive for peace, but it is their enemies that give them strength, and I think if man no longer had enemies, he would have to invent them, for his strength only grows from struggle.

Books are the perfect Time Machine. By the simple act of opening a book you can, in an instant, be travelling up a jungle river without once being bitten by mosquitoes, or you can almost die of thirst in the desert while holding a cold drink in your hand, or dine in the finest restaurants and never have to worry about paying the bill, or ride the wild country of our western frontier and never worry about losing your scalp to a raiding party.

A journey is time suspended.

Adventure is nothing but a romantic name for trouble.

Only one who has learned much can fully appreciate his ignorance.

When I was a small boy I often went to the woods to lie on the grass in the shade. Somehow I had come to believe the earth could give me wisdom, but it did not. Yet I learned a little about animals and learned it is not always brave to make a stand. It is often foolish. There is a time for courage and a time for flight.

A man's gotta do what a man's gotta do

The deep sea can be fathomed, but who knows the heart of a woman?

When a man is one of a kind, he will be lonely wherever he is.

To a fool time brings only age not wisdom.

My future is one I must make myself.

The best of all things is to learn. Money can be lost or stolen, health and strength may fail, but what you have committed to your mind is yours forever.

I would not sit waiting for some vague tomorrow, nor for something to happen. One could wait a lifetime, and find nothing at the end of the waiting. I would begin here, I would make something happen.

When feeding time comes around, there is nothing a hawk likes better than a nice, fat, peaceful dove.

Everyone has it within his power to say, this I am today, that I shall be tomorrow.

Love is a moment of stillness that sometimes a word can shatter to pieces. Or love can be a thing that endures, a rich, deep current flowing unending through the years.

Who mentioned the Church? On the contrary, I have great respect for religion. My objection is to those who are against so many things and for so little.

What a man wants to do he generally can do, if he wants to badly enough.