Woodrow Wilson Quotes

Let him [the President] once win the admiration and confidence of the country, and no other single force can withstand him, no combination of forces will easily overpower him.... If he rightly interpret the national thought and boldly insist upon it, he is irresistible; and the country never feels the zest of action so much as when the President is of such insight and caliber.

Reality is what I see, not what you see.

The treasury of America lies in those ambitions, those energies, that cannot be restricted to a special favored class. It depends upon the inventions of unknown men, upon the originations of unknown men, upon the ambitions of unknown men. Every country is renewed out of the ranks of the unknown, not out of the ranks of those already famous and powerful and in control.

The shadows that now lie dark upon our path will soon be dispelled and we shall walk with the light all about us if we but be true to ourselves.

The profession I chose was politics; the profession I entered was law. I entered the one because I thought it would lead to the other.

Just what is it that America stands for? If she stands for one thing more than another it is for the sovereignty of self-governing people.

The most conservative persons I ever met are college undergraduates.

Politics is a war of causes; a joust of principles.

Some Americans need hyphens in their names because only part of them has come over.

It is like writing history with lightning and my only regret is that it is all so terribly true.

When correcting a child, the goal is to apply light, not heat.

A little group of willful men, representing no opinion but their own, have rendered the great government of the United States helpless and contemptible.

Princeton is no longer a thing for Princeton men to please themselves with. Princeton is a thing with which Princeton men must satisfy the country.

The interesting and inspiring thing about America is that she asks nothing for herself except what she has a right to ask for humanity itself.

The question of armaments, whether on land or sea, is the most immediately and intensely practical question connected with the future fortunes of nations and of mankind.

Excesses accomplish nothing. Disorder immediately defeats itself.

The law that will work is merely the summing up in legislative form of the moral judgment that the community has already reached.

What we seek is the reign of law, based upon the consent of the governed and sustained by the organized opinion of mankind.

You have just taken an oath of allegiance to the United States. Of allegiance to whom? Of allegiance to no one, unless it be God. Certainly not of allegiance to those who temporarily represent this great government. You have taken an oath of allegiance to a great ideal, to a great body of principles, to a great hope of the human race.

Liberty does not consist in mere declarations of the rights of man. It consists in the translation of those declarations into definite action.

Government is not a warfare of interests.

...men are not put into this world to go the path of ease, they are put into this world to go the path of pain and struggle.

You cannot tear up ancient rootages and safely plant the tree of liberty in soil that is not native to it.

The great monopoly in this country is the money monopoly. So long as it exists, our old variety of freedom and individual energy of development are out of the question.

We ought to regard ourselves and to act as socialists--believers in the wholesomeness and beneficence of the body politic.

Your real statesman is first of all, and chief of all, a great human being, with an eye for all the great fields on which men likehimself struggle, with unflagging, pathetic hope, toward better things.... He is a guide, a counselor, a mentor, a servant, a friend of mankind.

I can imagine no greater disservice to the country than to establish a system of censorship that would deny to the people of a free republic like our own their indisputable right to criticize their own public officials. While exercising the great powers of the office I hold, I would regret in a crisis like the one through which we are now passing to lose the benefit of patriotic and intelligent criticism.

Never murder a man when he's busy committing suicide.

America lives in the heart of every man everywhere who wishes to find a region where he will be free to work out his destiny as he chooses.

No government has ever been beneficent when the attitude of government was that it was taking care of the people. The only freedom consists in the people taking care of the government.

Just what is it that America stands for? If she stands for one thing more than another, it is for the sovereignty of self-governing people, and her example, her assistance, her encouragement, has thrilled two continents in this western world with all those fine impulses which have built up human liberty on sides of the water. She stands, therefore, as an example of independence, as an example of free institutions, and as an example of disinterested international action in the main tenets of justice.

We never found a real model (for our vision).

...to make the world safe for democracy.

Death comes along like a gas bill one can't payand that's all one can sayabout it.

Every great man of business has got somewhere a touch of the idealist in him.

I must beg you to indulge me in the matter of hyphens.... You will find that I have marked out a great many in the proofs. We arein danger of Germanizing our printing by using them so much, and I have a very decided preference in the matter.

We are participants, whether we would or not, in the life of the world.... We are partners with the rest. What affects mankind isinevitably our affair as well as the nations of Europe and Asia.

Neutrality is a negative word. It is a word that does not express what America ought to feel. America has a heart, and that heart throbs with all sorts of intense sympathies... We are not trying to keep out of trouble; we are trying to preserve the foundations upon which peace can be rebuilt.

Be militant! Be an organization that is going to do things! If you can find older men who will give you countenance and acceptableleadership, follow them; but if you cannot, organize separately and dispense with them. There are only two sorts of men to be associated with when something is to be done: Those are young men and men who never grow old.

If you will think about what you ought to do for other people, your character will take care of itself. Character is a by-product, and any man who devotes himself to its cultivation in his own case will become a selfish prig.

Some of us let these great dreams die, but others nourish and protect them; nurse them through bad days till they bring them to the sunshine and light...

Uncompromising thought is the luxury of the closeted recluse. Untrammeled reasoning is the indulgence of the philosopher, of the dreamer of sweet dreams.

Every one at the bottom of his heart cherishes vanity; even the toad thinks himself good-looking,--"rather tawny perhaps, but look at his eye!

There is no indispensable man.

America was born a Christian nation.

There can be no equality or opportunity if men and women and children be not shielded in their lives from the consequences of great industrial and social processes which they cannot alter, control, or singly cope with.

I believe very profoundly in an over-ruling Providence, and I do not fear that any real plans can be thrown off the track. It maynot be intended that I shall be President--but that would not break my heart.

To fight, you must be brutal and ruthless, and the spirit of ruthless brutality will enter into the very fibre of national life.