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Ambition Quotes

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Ambition Quotes

“The ambitious sacrifices all to what he terms honor, as the miser all to money.”

Term Sacrifice Honor Ambition Ambitious Misers

Author:Johann Kaspar Lavater

“How highly should we honor the Macedonians, who for the greater part of their lives never cease from fighting with the barbarians for the sake of the security of Greece? For who is not aware that Greece would have constantly stood in the greater danger, had we not been fenced by the Macedonians and the honorable ambition of their kings?”

Should Fighting Greater Security Danger Kings Honor Ambition Sake Cease Honorable Greece Barbarians Macedonia

Book:Polybius: the histories

Source: Polybius: the histories

“Man was mark'd A friend in his creation to himself, And may, with fit ambition, conceive The greatest blessings, and the highest honors Appointed for him, if he can achieve them The right and noble way.”

Ifs Men Way May Achieve Creation Honor Fit Blessing Ambition Highest Mark Noble Greatest Blessings

Book:The Dramatic Works of Massinger and Ford

Source: The Dramatic Works of Massinger and Ford

“Those whom the world has delighted to honor have oftener been influenced in their doings by ambition and vanity than by patriotism.”

World Honor Ambition Vanity Heroism Delighted Doings

Author:Francois de La Rochefoucauld

“If not for that of conscience, yet at least for ambition's sake, let us reject ambition, let us disdain that thirst of honor and renown, so low and mendicant; that it makes us beg it of all sorts of people.”

People Ifs Honor Ambition Lows Conscience Sake Rejects Thirst Disdain Renown

Book:Michel de Montaigne: Selected Essays

Source: Michel de Montaigne: Selected Essays

“Be not with honor's gilded baits beguil'd, Nor think ambition wise, because 'tis brave; For though we like it, as a forward child, 'Tis so unsound, her cradle is the grave.”

Thinking Children Wise Honor Ambition Brave Graves Cradle Bait Gilded

Author:William Davenant

“My ambition for station was always easily controlled. If the place came to me it was welcome. But it never seemed to me worth seeking at the cost of self-respect, or independence. My family were not historic; they were well-to-do, did not hold or seek office. It was easy for me to be contented in private life. An honor was no honor to me, if obtained by my own seeking.”

Ifs Wells Self Easy My Own Honor Cost Office Ambition My Family Independence Seeking Welcome Self Respect Stations Controlled Historic Private Life My Ambition

Author:Rutherford B. Hayes

“We honor ambition, we reward greed, we celebrate materialism, we worship acquisitiveness, we commercialize art, we cherish success and then we bark at the young about the gentle arts of the spirit. The kids know that if we really valued learning, we would pay our teachers what we pay our lawyers and stockbrokers. If we valued art, we would not measure it by its capacity to produce profits. If we regarded literature as important, we would remove it from the celebrity sweepstakes and spend a little money on our libraries.”

“To be ambitious of true honor, of the true glory and perfection of our natures, is the very principle and incentive of virtue.”

Nature Principles Virtue Honor Ambition Glory Perfection Ambitious Incentives My Ambition Life Ambition

Author:Walter Scott

“No stigma attaches to the love of money in America, and provided it does not exceed the bounds imposed by public order, it is held in honor. The American will describe as noble and estimable ambition that our medieval ancestors would have called base cupidity.”

Doe America Order Wealth Honor Ambition Bounds Noble Ancestor Exceed Medieval Stigma Love Of Money

Author:Alexis de Tocqueville

“To be ambitious of true honor and of the real glory and perfection of our nature is the very principle and incentive of virtue; but to be ambitious of titles, place, ceremonial respects, and civil pageantry, is as vain and little as the things are which we court”

Inspirational Littles Real Principles Virtue Honor Ambition Glory Perfection Court Vain Titles Ambitious Incentives Pageantry

Author:Philip Sidney

“To all our means of culture is added the powerful incentive to personal ambition, no post of honor is so high but the poorest may hope to reach it.”

May Mean Culture Powerful Honor Ambition Posts Presidential Incentives Poorest

Author:James A. Garfield