Quotes
Quotes about Action
Attack is the reaction. I never think I have hit hard unless it rebounds.
You had that action and counteraction which, in the natural and in the political world, from the reciprocal struggle of discordant powers draws out the harmony of the universe.
Disciplined inaction.
Action is transitory,--a step, a blow;
The motion of a muscle, this way or that.
This quiet sail is as a noiseless wing
To waft me from distraction.
Think'st thou existence doth depend on time?
It doth; but actions are our epochs.
Justice is truth in action.
Experience is the child of Thought, and Thought is the child of Action. We can not learn men from books.
Big words do not smite like war-clubs,
Boastful breath is not a bow-string,
Taunts are not so sharp as arrows,
Deeds are better things than words are,
Actions mightier than boastings.
The object, Truth, or the satisfaction of the intellect, and the object, Passion, or the excitement of the heart, are, although attainable, to a certain extent, in poetry, far more readily attainable in prose.
What the Puritans gave the world was not thought, but action.
Every man feels instinctively that all the beautiful sentiments in the world weigh less than a single lovely action.
Dreams grow holy put in action; work grows fair through starry dreaming,
But where each flows on unmingling, both are fruitless and in vain.
The great end of life is not knowledge but action.
"Reeling and Writhing, of course, to begin with," the Mock Turtle replied, "and the different branches of Arithmetic--Ambition, Distraction, Uglification, and Derision."
His eyes
All radiant with glad surprise,
Looked forward through the Centuries
And saw the seeds which sages cast
In the world's soil in cycles past
Spring up and blossom at the last;
Saw how the souls of men had grown,
And where the scythes of Truth had mown
Clear space for Liberty's white throne;
Saw how, by sorrow tried and proved,
The blackening stains had been removed
Forever from the land he loved;
Saw Treason crushed and Freedom crowned,
And clamorous Faction, gagged and bound,
Gasping its life out on the ground.
And there's a lust in man no charm can tame
Of loudly publishing our neighbour's shame;
On eagles' wings immortal scandals fly,
While virtuous actions are but born and die.
Note 15.In the Preface to Mr. Nichols's work on Autographs, among other albums noticed by him as being in the British Museum is that of David Krieg, with James Bobart's autograph (Dec. 8, 1697) and the verses,--
Virtus sui gloria.
"Think that day lost whose descending sun
Views from thy hand no noble action done."
Bobart died about 1726. He was a son of the celebrated botanist of that name. The verses are given as an early instance of their use.
It is circumstance and proper measure that give an action its character, and make it either good or bad.
Whenever Alexander heard Philip had taken any town of importance, or won any signal victory, instead of rejoicing at it altogether, he would tell his companions that his father would anticipate everything, and leave him and them no opportunities of performing great and illustrious actions.
Democritus said, words are but the shadows of actions.
When Demosthenes was asked what was the first part of oratory, he answered, "Action;" and which was the second, he replied, "Action;" and which was the third, he still answered, "Action."
Statesmen are not only liable to give an account of what they say or do in public, but there is a busy inquiry made into their very meals, beds, marriages, and every other sportive or serious action.
In a word, neither death, nor exile, nor pain, nor anything of this kind is the real cause of our doing or not doing any action, but our inward opinions and principles.
If what the philosophers say be true,--that all men's actions proceed from one source; that as they assent from a persuasion that a thing is so, and dissent from a persuasion that it is not, and suspend their judgment from a persuasion that it is uncertain,--so likewise they seek a thing from a persuasion that it is for their advantage.
