Quotes from Wendell Phillips

The heart is the best reflective thinker.

Insurrection of thought always precedes insurrection of arms.

Two kinds of men generally best succeed in political life; men of no principle, but of great talent; and men of no talent, but of one principle - that of obedience to their superiors.

The keener the want the lustier the growth.

You can always get the truth from an American statesman after he has turned seventy, or given up all hope of the Presidency.

Seldom ever was any knowledge given to keep, but to impart; the grace of this rich jewel is lost in concealment.

Truth is one forever absolute, but opinion is truth filtered through the moods, the blood, the disposition of the spectator.

You can always get the truth from an American statesman after he has turned 70, or given up all hope of the Presidency.

Physical bravery is an animal instinct; moral bravery is a much higher and truer courage.

What the Puritans gave the world was not thought, but action.

Common sense does not ask an impossible chessboard, but takes the one before it and plays the game.

Wants awaken intellect. To gratify them disciplines intellect. The keener the want the lustier the growth.

Law is nothing unless close behind it stands a warm, living public opinion.

We live under a government of men and morning newspapers.

Let me make the newspapers, and I care not what is preached in the pulpit or what is enacted in Congress.

What is defeat? Nothing but education, nothing but the first step toward something better.

Politics is but the common pulse beat.

As the Greek said, "Many men know how to flatter, few men know how to praise."

Every step of progress the world has made has been from scaffold to scaffold, and from stake to stake.

Every step of progress which the world has made has been from scaffold to scaffold, and from stake to stake.

Revolutions are not made; they come.

Right is the eternal sun; the world cannot delay its coming.

War and Niagara thunder to a music of their own.

Our agitation, you know, helps keep yours alive in the rank and file.