1,016 Courage Quotes

If you hear a voice within you say 'you cannot paint,' then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced.

There may be a time in life when one is tired of everything and feels as if all one does is wrong, and there maybe some truth in it - do you think this is a feeling one must try to forget and to banish, or is it 'the longing for God,' which one must not fear, but cherish to see if it may bring us some good? Is it 'the longing for God' which leads us to make a choice which we never regret? Let us keep courage and try to be patient and gentle. And not mind being eccentric, and make distinction between good and evil.

Courage is poorly housed that dwells in numbers; the lion never counts the herd that are about him, nor weighs how many flocks he has to scatter.

The probability that we may fail in the struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a cause we believe to be just.

Only so you can appeal to your God and pray Him to support and bless your courage, your work, your perseverance, your strength, your resolution, and with all these your claim on life.

For the sake of historical truth I must verify that only the Greeks, of all the adversaries who confronted us, fought with bold courage and highest disregard of death.

Not one of us knows what effect his life produces, and what he gives to others; that is hidden from us and must remain so, though we are often allowed to see some little fraction of it, so that we may not lose courage.

Not less strong than the will to truth must be the will to sincerity. Only an age, which can show the courage of sincerity, can possess truth, which works as a spiritual force within it.

Courage is the first of human qualities because it is the quality which guarantees the others.

To run away from trouble is a form of cowardice and, while it is true that the suicide braves death, he does it not for some noble object but to escape some ill.

You will never do anything in this world without courage. It is the greatest quality of the mind next to honor.

Come back again, old heart! Ah me! Methinks in those thy coward fears There might, perchance, a courage be, That fails in these the manlier years; Courage to let the courage sink, Itself a coward base to think, Rather than not for heavenly light Wait on to show the truly right.

We must have courage, faith, and lunch together sometime soon.

It's hard to face tomorrow, but it's easier than facing no tomorrow.

I can face anything, except the future, and certain parts of the past and present.

Don't let the fear of striking out hold you back.

Never let the fear of striking out get in your way.

Oh why do we not say the important things, it would be so easy, and we are damned because we do not.

To save the world requires faith and courage: faith in reason, and courage to proclaim what reason shows to be true.

I do not regret one professional enemy I have made. Any actor who doesn't dare to make an enemy should get out of the business.

Better to die fighting for freedom then be a prisoner all the days of your life.

I would rather be free in my mind, and be locked up in a prison cell, than to be a coward and not be able to say what I want.

Mistakes are always forgivable, if one has the courage to admit them.

If the angels are unkind or the season is dark Or if in the end Love just falls apart Well then here's to our destruction Baby let me be your soul driver.

Those afraid of the universe as it really is, those who pretend to nonexistent knowledge and envision a Cosmos centered on human beings will prefer the fleeting comforts of superstition. They avoid rather than confront the world. But those with the courage to explore the weave and structure of the Cosmos, even where it differs profoundly from their wishes and prejudices, will penetrate its deepest mysteries.

It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to, than I have ever known.

I must honor those who fight of their own free will, he said to himself. And I must try to imitate their courage by following my path as a pacifist, wherever it takes me.

The truth is always modern and there never comes a time when it is safe to give it voice.

Lost causes are the only ones worth fighting for.

Never be silent! Make your opinions known, and do not fear retribution for speaking your mind! The only ones who will aggressively try to silence you are the ones who do not respect the liberties and rights of the individual. Those people deserve our contempt, and when you draw them out of the shadows by exercising your civil right to freedom of speech, they will expose themselves for what they truly are.

Whether you actually can or can't fight city hall is of little relevance. Either way, when the need arises, you must!

Fortune favors the audacious.

I would not have believed such an inferno could open up on earth. Men died but they did not retreat.

'I've got bigger balls than every man in this arena!'

The sun, that brave man, Comes through boughs that lie in wait, That brave man. Green and gloomy eyes In dark forms of the grass Run away. The good stars, Pale helms and spiky spurs, Run away. Fears of my bed, Fears of life and fears of death, Run away. That brave man comes up From below and walks without meditation, That brave man.

He imposes orders as he thinks of them, As the fox and snake do. It is a brave affair.

Take the serious side of Disney, the Confucian side of Disney. It's in having taken an ethos ... where you have the values of courage and tenderness asserted in a way that everybody can understand. You have got an absolute genius there. You have got a greater correlation of nature than you have had since the time of Alexander the Great.

Resolved - never to do anything which I should be afraid to do, if it were my last of life.

The mark of leadership is not to stand up when everybody is standing, but rather to actually stand up when no one else is standing.

As the friendly force maneuvered through the treacherous region, it was suddenly subjected to an intense small arms fire from a well-concealed insurgent element. Although painfully wounded in the initial volley, Captain Clark immediately directed his men on a counter-assault of the enemy positions. With complete disregard for his personal safety, Captain Clark remained with his unit until the reactionary force arrived and the situation was well-in-hand. His courageous initiative and exemplary professionalism significantly contributed to the successful outcome of the engagement. Captain Clark's unquestionable valor in close combat against a hostile force is in keeping with the finest traditions of the military service and reflects great credit upon himself, the 1st Infantry Division, and the United States Army.

Please don't worry about me, Captain Patzig. I'm an incurable optimist. And as far as those fellows are concerned, I think I know how to get along with them.

Terror in the house does roar, But Pity stands before the door.

Swift has sailed into his rest; Savage indignation there Cannot lacerate his breast. Imitate him if you dare, World-besotted traveller; he Served human liberty.

Without risks or prizes for the darer, history would be insipid indeed; and there is a type of military character which every one feels that the race should never cease to breed, for everyone is sensitive to its superiority. The duty is incumbent on mankind, of keeping military character in stock - if keeping them, if not for use, then as ends in themselves and as pure pieces of perfection, - so that Roosevelt's weaklings and mollycoddles may not end by making everything else disappear from the face of nature.

Yet was Rob Roy as wise as brave; Forgive me if the phrase be strong;- A Poet worthy of Rob Roy Must scorn a timid song.

When we reflect upon the brutal vices of these salt-water bandits, pirates as shameful as any whom the sea has borne, or recoil from their villainous destruction and cruel deeds, we must also remember the discipline, the fortitude, the comradeship and martial virtues which made them at this period beyond all challenge the most formidable and daring race in the world.

Joan was a being so uplifted from the ordinary run of mankind that she finds no equal in a thousand years. She embodied the natural goodness and valour of the human race in unexampled perfection. Unconquerable courage, infinite compassion, the virtue of the simple, the wisdom of the just, shone forth in her. She glorifies as she freed the soil from which she sprang.

Withhold no sacrifice, begrudge no toil, seek no sordid gain, fear no foe, all will be well.

In attack most daring, in defence most cunning, in endurance most steadfast, they performed a feat of arms which will be remembered and recounted as long as the virtues of courage and resolution have power to move the hearts of men. (on the First Airborne Division at Arnhem)

All I had to do was do it.

'You see the powerful got nervous, cause he refused to be their servant, and he spit truths, that burnt like black churches [from Voice of the Voiceless, a tribute song to Mumia Abu Jamal]'

'Love without courage and wisdom is sentimentality, as with the ordinary church member. Courage without love and wisdom is foolhardiness, as with the ordinary soldier. Wisdom without love and courage is cowardice, as with the ordinary intellectual. Therefore one with love, courage, and wisdom is one in a million who moves the world, as with Jesus, Buddha, and Gandhi.'

Though I be a woman yet I have as good a courage answerable to my place as ever my father had. I am your anointed Queen. I will never be by violence constrained to do anything. I thank God I am endued with such qualities that if I were turned out of the Realm in my petticoat I were able to live in any place in Christendom.

Mark: Yeah, I mean, I concur. The change in the hair, you really light up the screen Hayley, you just, it's beautiful what you're doing. Um, the choice of song. I would never in a million of years have thought of that song for you and you almost got away with it but the bravery and the choice. Congratulations Hayley. Good on you.

Honor made him a man. Courage made him a hero. History made him a Legend.

Heaven gave Rob Roy a dauntless heart And wondrous length and strength of arm: Nor craved he more to quell his foes, Or keep his friends from harm. Yet was Rob Roy as wise as brave; Forgive me if the phrase be strong; - A Poet worthy of Rob Roy Must scorn a timid song.

The leader of a company should not hesitate at any moment to harden his rhetoric when necessary; to unsheath his sword when called upon, without fear of being called a radical. In fact, what assures his legitimacy is his personal conviction that the company and its longevity must always be relentlessly pursued.

He who is not smart enough to create, must be brave enough to copy.

Society, in the aggregate, is no fool. It is astonishing what an amount of 'eccentricity' it will stand from anybody who takes the bull by the horns, too fearless or too indifferent to think of consequences. ~ Ch. 9

It may often be noticed, the less virtuous people are, the more they shrink away from the slightest whiff of the odour of un-sanctity. The good are ever the most charitable, the pure are the most brave. ~ Ch. 11

Oh glory, that we wrestle So valiantly with Time!

And every breath I breathe until the moment I'm deceased/Will be another moment ballin' as a 'G'/I rip the crowd, then I start again/Internally I live in sin/until the moment that they let me breathe again/The heartz of men

This was to no doubt reaffirm Indo-Fijian bravery, they suffered greatly under indenture and were often unfairly and needlessly provoked. They bore it with fortitude and grace.

A decline in courage may be the most striking feature that an outside observer notices in the West today. The Western world has lost its civic courage, both as a whole and separately, in each country, in each government, in each political party, and, of course, in the United Nations. Such a decline in courage is particularly noticeable among the ruling and intellectual elites, causing an impression of a loss of courage by the entire society. There are many courageous individuals, but they have no determining influence on public life. Political and intellectual functionaries exhibit this depression, passivity, and perplexity in their actions and in their statements, and even more so in their self-serving rationales as to how realistic, reasonable, and intellectually and even morally justified it is to base state policies on weakness and cowardice. And the decline in courage, at times attaining what could be termed a lack of manhood, is ironically emphasized by occasional outbursts and inflexibility on the part of those same functionaries when dealing with weak governments and with countries that lack support, or with doomed currents which clearly cannot offer resistance. But they get tongue-tied and paralyzed when they deal with powerful governments and threatening forces, with aggressors and international terrorists. Should one point out that from ancient times decline in courage has been considered the beginning of the end?

'Nay - rather yet that I could raise One hope that warm'd me in the days While still I yearn'd for human praise. 'When, wide in soul, and bold of tongue, Among the tents I paused and sung, The distant battle flash'd and rung. 'I sung the joyful Paean clear, And, sitting, burnish'd without fear The brand, the buckler, and the spear - 'Waiting to strive a happy strife, To war with falsehood to the knife, And not to lose the good of life - 'Some hidden principle to move, To put together, part and prove, And mete the bounds of hate and love - 'As far as might be, to carve out Free space for every human doubt, That the whole mind might orb about - 'To search thro' all I felt or saw, The springs of life, the depths of awe, And reach the law within the law: 'At least, not rotting like a weed, But, having sown some generous seed, Fruitful of further thought and deed, 'To pass, when Life her light withdraws, Not void of righteous self-applause, Nor in a merely selfish cause - 'In some good cause, not in mine own, To perish, wept for, honour'd, known, And like a warrior overthrown...

She knew he was telling his soul what it needed to hear so that he could gather his courage to go and go what he must

some men know from birth that they are expendable: they fought to won. If you did not win, you did not run either

And at some point, I know that one of my daughters will ask, perhaps my youngest, will ask, 'Daddy, why is this monument here? What did this man do?' How might I answer them? Unlike the others commemorated in this place, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was not a president of the United States - at no time in his life did he hold public office. He was not a hero of foreign wars. He never had much money, and while he lived he was reviled at least as much as he was celebrated. By his own accounts, he was a man frequently racked with doubt, a man not without flaws, a man who, like Moses before him, more than once questioned why he had been chosen for so arduous a task - the task of leading a people to freedom, the task of healing the festering wounds of a nation's original sin. And yet lead a nation he did. Through words he gave voice to the voiceless. Through deeds he gave courage to the faint of heart. By dint of vision, and determination, and most of all faith in the redeeming power of love, he endured the humiliation of arrest, the loneliness of a prison cell, the constant threats to his life, until he finally inspired a nation to transform itself, and begin to live up to the meaning of its creed. Like Moses before him, he would never live to see the Promised Land. But from the mountain top, he pointed the way for us - a land no longer torn asunder with racial hatred and ethnic strife, a land that measured itself by how it treats the least of these, a land in which strength is defined not simply by the capacity to wage war but by the determination to forge peace - a land in which all of God's children might come together in a spirit of brotherhood. We have not yet arrived at this longed for place. For all the progress we have made, there are times when the land of our dreams recedes from us - when we are lost, wandering spirits, content with our suspicions and our angers, our long-held grudges and petty disputes, our frantic diversions and tribal allegiances. And yet, by erecting this monument, we are reminded that this different, better place beckons us, and that we will find it not across distant hills or within some hidden valley, but rather we will find it somewhere in our hearts.

completely dare be beautiful

because it's Spring thingS dare to do people

the cunning the craven : they live for until though the sun in his heaven says Now

We must make the building of a free society once more an intellectual adventure, a deed of courage. What we lack is a liberal Utopia, a programme which seems neither a mere defence of things as they are nor a diluted kind of socialism, but a truly liberal radicalism which does not spare the susceptibilities of the mighty (including the trade unions), which is not too severely practical and which does not confine itself to what appears today as politically possible:Those who have concerned themselves exclusively with what seemed practicable in the existing state of opinion have constantly found that even this has rapidly become politically impossible as the result of changes in a public opinion which they have done nothing to guide. Unless we can make the philosophic foundations of a free society once more a living intellectual issue, and its implementation a task which challenges the ingenuity and imagination of our liveliest minds, the prospects of freedom are indeed dark. But if we can regain that belief in power of ideas which was the mark of liberalism at its best, the battle is not lost.

Take the case of courage. No quality has ever so much addled the brains and tangled the definitions of merely rational sages. Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of a readiness to die. 'He that will lose his life, the same shall save it,' is not a piece of mysticism for saints and heroes. It is a piece of everyday advice for sailors or mountaineers. It might be printed in an Alpine guide or a drill book. This paradox is the whole principle of courage; even of quite earthly or quite brutal courage. A man cut off by the sea may save his life if he will risk it on the precipice. He can only get away from death by continually stepping within an inch of it. A soldier surrounded by enemies, if he is to cut his way out, needs to combine a strong desire for living with a strange carelessness about dying. He must not merely cling to life, for then he will be a coward, and will not escape. He must not merely wait for death, for then he will be a suicide, and will not escape. He must seek his life in a spirit of furious indifference to it; he must desire life like water and yet drink death like wine.

In 1584, twenty-five years before Galileo lifted a telescope, Bruno took the Copernican hypothesis to the outrageous new conclusion that the sun is merely one of an infinity of stars, which stretch across boundless and inexhaustible space. It was consummate audacity to proclaim an infinite universe in the teeth of the doctrinal dogfights of the 16th century. It was yet bolder to exult in the de immenso with the bounding wonder of a poet. The prospect of our earth reduced to a turning speck in endless space was terrifying to contemplate. An ecstatic Bruno cried, 'My thoughts are stitched to the stars!' and contemplated little else. With an impetuous abandon that his contemporaries found reckless and even dangerous, Bruno proceeded to rethink man's relationship to the universe, to himself, and to God by the unimaginable light of countless stars. His conclusions were simply unbelievable for a late medieval mind: infinite other worlds, inhabited like our own, spread throughout space; a structure to the universe of suns and clusters of suns circling in grand orbits, but no 'center' except in the ground beneath two human feet; the presence of God not atop an empyrean throne past the threshold of the farthest stars, but inhabiting every atom of matter; an eternal span to matter, which can change its form but never be exhausted in any proportion; and finally a logic infinity demanded of him - an innate union of all contraries, by which evil and good, history and the future, localized humanity and an infinite universe inform and express one another...

Mr. Smith Goes to Washington: Jefferson Smith

It takes a courageous Mormon to turn to archaeology to support their argument

Poor is the triumph o'er the timid hare! Scared from the corn, and now to some lone seat Retired-

The waves are many and the surging sea dangerous. But we are not afraid we may be drowned. For we are standing on the rock. Let the sea rage as it will, it cannot split the rock asunder. Though the waves tower on high, they cannot overwhelm the boat of Jesus. What, pray, are we afraid of? Death? 'For me life is Christ, and death gain.' But tell me, is it exile? 'The earth is the Lord's, and all it contains.' Is it the loss of property? We brought nothing into the world. It is certain we can take nothing out of it. The terrors of the world I despise, its treasures I deem laughable. I am not afraid of poverty, I do not long for wealth. I do not dread death, I do not pray to live, except to help you advance in virtue. So I simply note what is happening at present and I call on you, my dear people, to be of good heart

About two years ago a young lady came into my office, and I knew immediately something was wrong. Her eyes were kind of glazed, and her head was nodding, and I asked, 'What's the matter'' She replied, 'Oh, Dr. Buscaglia, in order to get enough courage to come to see you, I had to drink a whole bottle of Ripple! And I think I am going to be sick!' Imagining... having to drink a bottle of Ripple to summon up the courage to come to see me. All I do is put my hands out and say, 'Hi.' I cover their hands with mine and lead them into my office, and I can see a look of panic on their faces, 'What's he going to do to me?' I am not going to do anything to you! I just want you to know that I cry, too, and I feel, too, and I care, too, and I don't know everything, too, and therefore, we can start with a common frame of reference - human being to human being. If anybody tries to play the game of 'follow the guru' with me, they will be lost, for they will learn that I am just as confused as they are. The difference may be that I know it. A Buddhist teacher once said to me, 'Why do you keep moving? You are already there.' And all of a sudden it occurred to me - my goodness, I am!

who will draw the calvary in risk his very own precious skin to make our Angelinia a free and peaceful land again? Henry who'll love a poor orphan child? Henry Darger

General, the battle draws to a close and I make my report. This is where and how I fought. I fell wounded, lost heart, but did not desert. Though my teeth clattered from fear, I bound my forehead tightly with a red handkerchief to hide the blood, and ran to the assault. Before you shall pluck out the precious feathers of my jackdaw soul, one by one, until it remains a tiny clod of earth kneaded with blood, sweat, and tears. I shall relate my struggle to you - in order to unburden myself. I shall cast off virtue, shame, and truth - in order to unburden myself. My soul resembles your creation 'Toledo in the Storm'; girded by yellow thunderbolts and oppressive black clouds, fighting a desperate, unbending battle against both light and darkness. You will see my soul, will weigh it between your lanceolate eyebrows, and will judge. Do you remember the grave Cretan saying, 'Return where you have failed, leave where you have succeeded'? If I failed, I shall return to the assault though but a single hour of life remains to me. If I succeeded, I shall open the earth so that I may come and recline at your side. Listen, therefore, to my report, general, and judge. Listen to my life, grandfather, and if I fought with you, if I fell wounded and allowed no one to learn of my suffering, if I never turned my back to the enemy: Give me your blessing!

I don't care if it's the whole world that everything in it, on it, and above it. I...will...not...bend.

Hiding from your enemy is the same as letting him win

It makes people willing to act according to what they believe. To say what's in their hearts, regardless of shame. It doesn't change what they feel, what they want. It just helps...loosen them up

I realized that to [him], at least, cowardice was not something to be loathed, it was something to be cast out, to be exorcised, to be killed

Ansset could clearly hear the fear singing through the back of his brave words. Well, why not? Death was certain now, and Ansset knew of no one, except perhaps an old man like Mikal, who could look at death, especially death that also meant failure, without some fear

[he] looked death in the eye and did not seem disappointed

Kiss that frog, lady kiss that frog Get wet, get wet

If ever I see it is expedient to Islam that I say something, I'll say it and it up without fear of anything. Thanks God, I've not felt fear so far. T they were taking me away, it was they who were afraid and i pacified it

'Then the Bishop rose, and in a light scoffing tone, florid and he assured us there was nothing in the idea of evolution; rock-pigeons were what rock-pigeons had always been. Then, turning to his antagonist with a smiling insolence, he begged to know, was it through his grandfather or his grandmother that he claimed his descent from a monkey? On this Mr Huxley slowly and deliberately arose. A slight tall figure stern and pale, very quiet and very grave, he stood before us, and spoke those tremendous words - words which no one seems sure of now, nor I think, could remember just after they were spoken, for their meaning took away our breath, though it left us in no doubt as to what it was. He was not ashamed to have a monkey for his ancestor; but he would be ashamed to be connected with a man who used great gifts to obscure the truth. No one doubted his meaning and the effect was tremendous.' One lady fainted and had to carried out: I, for one, jumped out of my seat; and when in the evening we met at Dr Daubeney's, every one was eager to congratulate the hero of the day.

Love to clown when you deep, but when you on that solo creep/out on the streets you don't hear a peep

I'm ready to die right here tonight, and motherfuck they life/That's what they screamin as they drill me, but I'm hard to kill/So open fire, I see you kill me witness my steel