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Ambition Quotes

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Ambition Quotes

“Wherever moral ambition exists, there right exists. And moral ambition itself must be presumed present in subconsciousness, even when the conscious self seems to reject it, so long as society has resources for bringing it into action; in much the same way that the life-saver presumes life to exist in the drowned man until he has exhausted his resources for recovering respiration.”

Men Way Long Self Seems Action Moral Ambition Conscious Resources Rejects Exhausted Recovering Respiration

Author:William Ernest Hocking

“The primary ambition of Nietzsche's critique of knowledge is ... to demonstrate that 'truths' are fictions masking moral commitments.”

Fiction Moral Ambition Commitment Primaries Critique

Book:Break-Out from the Crystal Palace: The Anarcho-Psychological Critique: Stirner, Nietzsche, Dostoevsky

Source: Break-Out from the Crystal Palace: The Anarcho-Psychological Critique: Stirner, Nietzsche, Dostoevsky

“Society,--the only field where the sexes have ever met on terms of equality, the arena where character is formed and studied, the cradle and the realm of public opinion, the crucible of ideas, the world's university, at once a school and a theater, the spur and the crown of ambition, the tribunal which unmasks pretension and stamps real merit, the power that gives government leave to be, and outruns the lazy Church in fixing the moral sense of the eye.”

Source: Speeches, Lectures, and Letters

“Fancy has an extensive influence in morals. Some of the most powerful and dangerous feelings in nature, as those of ambition and envy, derive their principal nourishment from a cause apparently so trivial. Its effect on the common affairs of life is greater than might be supposed. Naked reality would scarcely keep the world in motion.”

Source: Aphorisms and Reflections: A Miscellany of Thought and Opinion

“Sex is an aspect of human existence that has fallen prey in special measure to a very special form of theological science: the theological outgrowth or offshoot known as moral theology. Its biblical foundations are meager in the sense that nothing of the kind exists in the New Testament, so it has had to achieve its ambition largely by dint of its own efforts.”

Humans Kind Form Sex Effort Existence Known Moral Achieve Special Ambition Aspect Foundation Theology Fallen Biblical Testament Prey New Testament Human Existence Theological

Author:Uta Ranke-Heinemann

“Ambition is the subtlest beast of the intellectual and moral field. It is wonderfully adroit in concealing itself from its owner.”

Moral Fields Ambition Intellectual Beast Owners Concealing

Author:John Adams

“A constitution founded on these principles introduces knowledge among the people, and inspires them with a conscious dignity becoming freemen; a general emulation takes place, which causes good humor, sociability, good manners, and good morals to be general. That elevation of sentiment inspired by such a government, makes the common people brave and enterprising. That ambition which is inspired by it makes them sober, industrious, and frugal.”

Source: The Works of John Adams Vol. 4: Novanglus, Thoughts on Government, Defence of the Constitution I

“I acquired more wealth, power, and prestige than most. But you can acquire all you want and still feel empty. It took a deadly illness to put me eye to eye with that truth, but it is a truth that the country, caught up in its ruthless ambitions and moral decay, can learn on my dime. I don't know who will lead us through the '90s, but they must be made to speak to this spiritual vacuum at the heart of American society, this tumor of the soul.”

“We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge or gallantry would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution is designed only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate for any other.”

Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations

“But women are very differently situated with respect to eachother - for they are all rivals (...) Is it then surprising that when the sole ambition of woman centres in beauty, and interest gives vanity additional force, perpetual rivalships should ensue? They are all running the same race, and would rise above the virtue of morals, if they did not view each other with a suspicious and even envious eye.”

Ifs Giving Should Eye Running Force Interest Views Race Moral Virtue Ambition Vanity Surprising Perpetual Sole Centre Rivals Suspicious Rise Above Envious

Author:Mary Wollstonecraft

“Well-being and happiness never appeared to me as an absolute aim. I am even inclined to compare such moral aims to the ambitions of a pig.”

Wells Happiness Goal Moral Ambition Absolutes Aim Well Being Compare Pigs Circle Of Friends Precocious

Author:Albert Einstein

“In a president, character is everything. A president doesn't have to be brilliant... He doesn't have to be clever; you can hire clever... You can hire pragmatic, and you can buy and bring in policy wonks. But you cant buy courage and decency, you cant rent a strong moral sense. A president must bring those things with him. He needs to have, in that much maligned word, but a good one nonetheless, a vision of the future he wishes to create.. But a vision is worth little if a president doesn't have the character - the courage and heart - to see it through.”

Ifs Needs Heart Littles Character Strong Wish President Moral Vision Courage Policy Ambition Brilliant Clever Cant Decency Pragmatic Visions Of The Future

Author:Peggy Noonan

“No compact among men... can be pronounced everlasting and inviolable, and if I may so express myself, that no Wall of words, that no mound of parchment can be so formed as to stand against the sweeping torrent of boundless ambition on the one side, aided by the sapping current of corrupted morals on the other.”

Ifs Men May Character Sides Moral Wall Ambition Currents Everlasting Boundless Sweeping Compact

Author:George Washington