Woodrow Wilson

We grow great by dreams. All big men are dreamers. They see things in the soft haze of a spring day or in the red fire of a long winter's evening. 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 which comes always to those who sincerely hope that their dreams will come true.

We live in an age disturbed, confused, bewildered, afraid of its own forces, in search not merely of its road but even of its direction. There are many voices of counsel, but few voices of vision; there is much excitement and feverish activity, but little concert of thoughtful purpose. We are distressed by our own ungoverned, undirected energies and do many things, but nothing long. It is our duty to find ourselves.

Once lead this people into war and they will forget there ever was such a thing as tolerance.

No nation is fit to sit in judgement upon any other nation.

The world must be made safe for democracy. Its peace must be planted upon the tested foundations of political liberty.

You are not here merely to make a living. You are here in order to enable the world to live more amply, with greater vision, with a finer spirit of hope and achievement. You are here to enrich the world, and you impoverish yourself if you forget the errand.

The world must be made safe for democracy.

I'd rather lose a cause that will one day win than win a cause that will some day lose.

...it is as hard to do your duty when men are sneering at you as when they are shooting at you.

Power consists in one's capacity to link his will with the purpose of others, to lead by reason and a gift of cooperation.

The man who is swimming against the stream knows the strength of it.

I not only use all the brains that I have, but all that I can borrow.

A conservative is a man who sits and thinks, mostly sits.

There is no higher religion than human service. To work for the common good is the greatest creed.

No man can sit down and withhold his hands from the warfare against wrong and get peace from his acquiescence.

One cool judgment is worth a thousand hasty councils. The thing is to supply light and not heat.

I can imagine no greater disservice to the county 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 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.

When men take up arms to set other men free, there is something sacred and holy in the warfare.

The flag is the embodiment, not of sentiment, but of history.

If you want to make enemies, try to change something.

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.

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.

Only a peace between equals can last. Only a peace the very principle of which is equality and a common participation in a common benefit.

In the last analysis, my fellow country men, as we in America would be the first to claim, a people are responsible for the acts of their government.

If a dog will not come to you after he has looked you in face, you should go home and examine your consicence.

Here is a great body of our Jewish citizens from whom have sprung men of genius in every walk of our varied life; men who have conceived of its ideals with singular clearness; and led enterprises with sprit & sagacity... They are not Jews in America, they are American citizens.

The history of liberty is the history of resistance. The history of liberty is a history of the limitation of governmental power, not the increase of it.

You are not here merely to make a living. You are here to enable the world to live more amply, with greater vision, and with a finer spirit of hope and achievement. You are here to enrich the world. You impoverish yourself if you forget this errand.

There is such a thing as a man being too proud to fight; there is such a thing as a nation being so right that it does not need to convince others by force that it is right.