Oliver DeMille Quotes

The problem in modern America is not that an individual can't make a difference, but that nearly all of us are too distracted to even consider trying.

Find a model of great education in history and you will find a great teacher who inspired students to make the hard choice to study. Wherever you find such a teacher, you will also find self-motivated students who study hard. When students study hard, learning occurs.

Our middle class majority, deeply in personal debt, elects political leaders who increase our benefits. Then we vote them out because we dislike the soaring national debt.

The liberal arts are the arts of communication and thinking. 'They are the arts indispensable to further learning, for they are the arts of reading, writing, speaking, listening, figuring.

The war is for the family. The battle for their children's education and their grandchildren's freedom is as real to them as if they could witness the clangs of bayonets on the field or hear the blasts of mortars in the harbor.

Will we follow the course of societies past that have lost their way and crumbled under the devastating forces of economic upheaval, war and other crises? Or we pull together as families and communities to create a brighter future?

Since the purpose of reading, of education, is to become good, our most important task is to choose the right books. Our personal set of stories, our canon, shapes our lives. I believe it is a law of the universe that we will not rise above our canon. Our canon is part of us, deeply, subconsciously. And the characters and teachings in our canon shape our characters--good, evil, mediocre, or great.

There are really only two ways to teach. You can inspire the student to voluntarily and enthusiastically choose to do the hard work necessary to get a great education, or you can attempt to require it of him.

"Thanks," many small businesspeople are saying, "but no thanks. Forget the government credits and loan programs, and just get rid of all the bureaucratic red tape and high taxes which make it hard to build businesses, hire employees and meet our payroll."

We tend to let our freedoms slip away because they are tucked away in documents and policies that we don't ever deal with directly.

This is the crisis! Difficulty getting credit, slow growth, high unemployment, low consumer confidence-these are challenges entrepreneurs can overcome with hard work, smart risk and tenacious teamwork. This is precisely what entrepreneurs do!

What is left that only the family can do? According to the new economy - nothing. The leading view today is 'It Takes a Village,' that even love can be outsourced to teachers, coaches, clubs and mentors. The truth is that it does take a village, a community, but a community of families working, playing, cooperating and facing obstacles together, not a community of government institutions.

The slaves in Rome were incapable of leisure and so their masters gave them entertainment to keep them pacified.

Virtually every subject is most effectively learned directly from the greatest thinkers, historians, artists, philosophers, scientists, prophets and their original works. Great works inspire greatness. Mediocre or poor works inspire mediocre or poor learning. The great accomplishments of humanity are the key to quality education.

When you look into the eyes of your children and grandchildren, when you picture their greatness and potential, do you feel that they are getting the education that is up to par with who they were born to become?

What the great mentor is always looking for is a person who is willing to tap his genius, to put it through the refiner's fire, to do the hard work to develop it. Indeed, mentoring is the medieval art of alchemy-turning plain old human steel into hearts and minds of gold.

The most powerful lessons occur where studies intersect with real life.

The U.S. should take notes: Government overspending and a campaign of alienating investors and small business isn't really the best way to boost the economy or overcome massive unemployment.

Intrapreneurs consider them-selves on a mission to help society, to give it what it needs and wants, to truly serve others and improve themselves. Like all producers, they believe in a deep accountability, refuse to assign blame, don't believe in failure, and give their heart and sould to truly serve the customer and benefit society.

No matter what the Constitution says, it won't endure if the people don't closely read it and demand that it be followed.

To prepare youth for success in entrepreneurial (and free) cultures, education tends to emphasize originality, creativity, breadth, depth and leadership skills rather than rote memorization, standardized curricula or socialization. The latter skill set is vital in societies with strong upper classes employing the lower castes, but the former is essential to free democratic nations.

Most people spend less than 20 hrs a year learning about freedom, yet many wonder why it's in decline. Don't fight upstream. Instead, turn it around.

If Americans are frustrated with Congress, imagine their frustration with a group of international bank officials running our ecomomy-bankers who may not have as their motive either to see us out of debt to them or to strengthen our economy, society, international influence, or other elements of our way of life.

Whatever happens in Washington, Wall Street, Hollywood or Silicon Vally in the next ten years, it will be irrelevant if our families don't come together at a much higher level. Without a renaissance of family, no new candidate can rise to save us. No new legislation, policy or program will heal our land.

Thinking is like exercise, it requires consistency and rigor. Like barbells in a weightlifting room, the classics force us to either put them down or exert our minds. They require us to think.

Nothing will have more impact on the future of the world than for each of us to find out why we were born and to do it. Human beings tend to do this when parents, teachers and other mentors invite us to it.

Until the American majority is willing to live within its means, it can hardly force its political leaders to do so.

Real value means people value-and creating value really means helping people choose better lives.

In our day, a vast majority of people is dependent either on an employer or the government-or both. One way to rate your level of independence might be to measure how long you can survive, feed your family and live in your home after your employer stops paying you anything.

The next step is for the great teachers to arise, and for them to clearly understand the challenges ahead and mentor accordingly. Where most generations focus the education of their children on preparing to make a living or succeed financially, leadership generations are taught by parents who see a higher role for their children.

The myth is that it is possible for one human being to educate another

Still reading but learning a lot about true education and the process of guiding our children in their educational pursuits.

Indeed, we have reached a level of complexity where simplicity itself is suspect. For example, the simple reality is that jobs migrate to less difficult nations. It's the old Rule of Capital: Capital goes where it is treated well.

Small business people have gotten us out of nearly all modern recessions - not by waiting for others to fix things or turning to government, but rather by applying leadership, inventiveness, creativity and originality.

Our generation, and that of our children, will face its share of crises, just like every generation in the past. When those calls come, will you be ready? The answer depends on how we educate the next generation.

In nations that have become too complex, taxes and regulation cause at least a doubling of the amount employers must spend on labor. Many experts call this 'progress,' but the natural result is that many companies respond by sending their operations and jobs to less costly nations.

Education means the ability to think independently and creatively, and development of the skill of applying one's knowledge in dealing with people and situations in the real world.

Jefferson, Madison and many others taught that complex laws and codes were sure signs of oppression. They agreed with Montesquieu, Lock and Hume and that laws must be simple....and indeed that the entire legal code must be simple enough that every citizen knows the entire law. If a person doesn't know the law....he shouldn't be held liable for breaking it or freedom is greatly reduced.

The shortest distance between where we are today as a nation and an effective return to increasing our freedoms and widespread prosperity is for regular American citizens to read and study the great books.

Prosperity and abundance in a society depend on a certain type of person: the producer. Societies with few producers stagnate and decay, while nations with a large number of producers vibrantly grow-in wealth, freedom, power, influence and the pursuit of happiness.

Producers think in the language of abundance rather than scarcity, take initiative instead of waiting for someone else to provide them with opportunity, and boldly venture wise risks instead of surrendering to fear that they can't make a difference.

The best thing government can do now is get out of the way and let small businesses innovate, hire and grow. Unfortunately, this is unlikely to happen unless Washington stops increasing regulations, taxes and other blocks to business growth.

Our children must be offered an education up to par with thier potential-and equal to the needs of the Twenty-first century.

Teachers teach and students educate. Students are the only true educators. Historically, every other method of education has failed. Education occurs when students get excited about learning and apply themselves; students do this when they experience great teachers.

Education occurs when students set out to educate themselves… the student will only learn, can only learn, what he chooses to learn…(An) advantage of not pushing is an innate sense (his) education is (his) responsibility and reward.

It is time to stop talking so much about what kind of leaders we want, to give less lip service to what Washington or Wall Street or Hollywood should do, and to act a lot more like citizens who actually deserve freedom.

Government intervention is not solving the problems, and in fact the governments around the world that are intervening the most in their economies are struggling more.

Those who wait for the future to happen before aligning their educational goals with the new realities will be left behind in the new ecomomy. A better path is to know what is ahead and prepare-this is education.