Our Centers for Ethics:

Quotations: Courage, fear, worry

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Worrying is like a rocking chair: it gives you something to do, but it doesn't get you anywhere.
— Unknown

Nurture your mind with great thoughts, for you will never go any higher than you think.
— Benjamin Disraeli, British statesman and novelist (1804-1881)

Courage is the price life exacts for peace.
— Amelia Earhart, American aviator (1897-1937)

Courage is being scared to death — and saddling up anyway.
— John Wayne (Marion Morrison), American actor (1907-1979)

The mighty oak was once a little nut that stood its ground.
— Unknown

Courage is like a muscle; it is strengthened by use.
— Ruth Gordon, American actress (1896-1985)

No one reaches a high position without daring.
— Publilius Syrus, Syrian-born Latin writer of maxims (fl. 1st century B.C.)

Great occasions do not make heroes or cowards; they simply unveil them to the eyes. Silently and imperceptibly, as we wake or sleep, we grow strong or we grow weak, and at last some crisis shows us what we have become.
— Brooke Foss Westcott, British theology professor and bishop (1825-1901)

The one permanent emotion of the inferior man is fear—fear of the unknown, the complex, the inexplicable. What he wants beyond everything else is safety.
— H. L. Mencken, American journalist and humorist (1880-1956)

I believe that anyone can conquer fear by doing the things he fears to do, provided he keeps doing them until he gets a record of successful experiences behind him.
— Eleanor Roosevelt, American stateswoman, First Lady (1884-1962)

Life is a compromise of what your ego wants to do, what experience tells you to do, and what nerves let you do.
— Bruce Crampton, professional golfer (b. 1935)

The art of living lies not in eliminating but in growing with troubles.
— Bernard M. Baruch, American financier (1870-1965)

All problems become smaller if you don’t dodge them, but confront them. Touch a thistle timidly, and it pricks you; grasp it boldly, and its spines crumble.
— William S. Halsey

Fortunately for themselves and the world, nearly all men are cowards and dare not act on what they believe. Nearly all our disasters come of a few fools having the courage of their convictions.
— Coventry Patmore, British poet (1823-1896)

It isn’t the absence of conscience or values that prevents us from being all we should be, it is simply the lack of moral courage.
— Michael Josephson, American ethicist

To see what is right and not to do it is cowardice.
— Confucius (K'ung-Fu-tzu), Chinese philosopher (551-479 B.C.)

One man with courage makes a majority.
— Andrew Jackson, American military hero and U.S. president (1767-1845)

It is better to die on one’s feet than to live on one’s knees.
— Albert Camus, French existentialist novelist (1913-1960)

Cowards die many times before their deaths; the valiant never taste of death but once.
— William Shakespeare, English dramatist (1564-1616)

Cowardice. . . is almost always simply a lack of ability to suspend the functioning of the imagination.
— Ernest Hemingway, American novelist (1899-1961)

Courage easily finds its own eloquence.
— Plautus, Roman comic dramatist (c. 254-184 B.C.)

Fear comes from uncertainty. When we are absolutely certain, whether of our worth or worthlessness, we are almost impervious to fear.
— William Congreve, English dramatist (1670-1729)

The basest of all things is to be afraid.
— William Faulkner, American novelist (1897-1962)

In times of stress, be bold and valiant.
— Horace, Roman poet (65-8 B.C.)

Grief has limits, whereas apprehension has none. For we grieve only for what we know has happened, but we fear all that possibly may happen.
— Pliny the Younger, Roman judge and man of letters (61-113 A.D.)

Fear is an instructor of great sagacity, and the herald of all revolutions.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson, American essayist, public philosopher and poet (1803-1882)

The world has no room for cowards.
— Robert Louis Stevenson, Scottish novelist and adventurer (1850-1894)

If you let fear of consequence prevent you from following your deepest instinct, then your life will be safe, expedient and thin.
— Katharine Butler Hathaway, author

Proust has pointed out that the predisposition to love creates its own objects; is this not also true of fear?
— Elizabeth Bowen, Irish novelist (1899-1973)

What you are afraid to do is a clear indicator of the next thing you need to do.
— Unknown

When it comes to the pinch, human beings are heroic.
— George Orwell (Eric Blair), English journalist and novelist (1903-1950)

If we could be heroes, if just for one day.
— David Bowie (David Robert Jones), English pop music performer (b. 1947)

One must think like a hero merely to behave like a decent human being.
— May Sarton, American essayist and novelist (1912-1995)

What worries you, masters you.
— Haddon W. Robinson, American preacher, author, professor and TV show host

And each man stand with his face in the light of his own drawn sword. Ready to do what a hero can.
— Elizabeth Barrett Browning, English poet (1806-1861)

Necessity makes even the timid brave.
— Sallust, Roman historian and politician (c. 86-c. 35 B.C.)

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