Quotes About Power

Art gives its vision to beauty not always recognized. And it surrenders freely -- whatever power it possesses to every sincere soul that seeks it. But above all else--it presents us with the gift of ourselves.

Your tears are muscles, hinged on wings lunar and solar. Your touch: life and death. (from poem Angel of Mercy)

A people may let a king fall, yet still remain a people, but if a king let his people slip from him, he is no longer a king.

The great fish swallow up the small; and he who is most strenuous for the rights of the people, when vested with power, is as eager after the prerogatives of government.

You have seen power in its various forms--a benign deity, when exercised in the suppression of fraud, injustice, and tyranny, but a demon, when united with unbounded ambition--a wide-wasting fury, who has destroyed her thousands. Not an age of the world but has produced characters, to which whole human hecatombs have been sacrificed.

Let your observations and comparisons produce in your mind an abhorrence of domination and power, the parent of slavery, ignorance, and barbarism, which places man upon a level with his fellow tenants of the woods.

Should I draw you the picture of my heart, it would be what I hope you still would love, though it contained nothing new. The early possession you obtained there, and the absolute power you have ever maintained over it, leave not the smallest space unoccupied.

What is the history of mighty kingdoms and nations, but a detail of the ravages and cruelties of the powerful over the weak?

Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of husbands. Remember all men would be tyrants if they could.

I am more and more convinced that man is a dangerous creature and that power, whether vested in many or a few, is ever grasping, and like the grave, cries, 'Give, give.'

History is not a web woven with innocent hands. Among all the causes which degrade and demoralize men, power is the most constant and most active.

A people fired ... with love of their country and of liberty, a zeal for the public good, and a noble emulation of glory, will not be disheartened or dispirited by a succession of unfortunate events. But like them, may we learn by defeat the power of becoming invincible.

The fear of the Lord is true wisdom, and he who hath it not can in no way penetrate the true secrets of magic...

Yet despite her time-consuming preoccupations with sensual pleasure, Catherine was a dedicated and hard-working sovereign. Not since Peter the Great had Russia been governed by a ruler as energetic, devoted, and successful as she. She wielded decisive power in formulating and executing state policies in both domestic and foreign affairs.

decided to massacre subjects indiscriminately in Red Square. According to some accounts, the tsar himself participated in the executions. On one occasion, he is said to have cut off eighty-four rebel heads with a sword. In all, over twelve hundred streltsy were exterminated, and many of their heads were left in the streets of Moscow over winter in order to terrorize the population.

Remember that there is meaning beyond absurdity. Know that every deed counts, that every word is power...Above all, remember that you must build your life as if it were a work of art.

People of our time are losing the power of celebration. Instead of celebrating we seek to be amused or entertained. Celebration is an active state, an act of expressing reverence or appreciation. To be entertained is a passive state--it is to receive pleasure afforded by an amusing act or a spectacle.... Celebration is a confrontation, giving attention to the transcendent meaning of one's actions. Source: The Wisdom of Heschel

To gain control of the world of space is certainly one of our tasks. The danger begins when in gaining power in the realm of space we forfeit all aspirations in the realm of time. There is a realm of time where the goal is not to have but to be, not to own but to give, not to control but to share, not to subdue but to be in accord. Life goes wrong when the control of space, the acquisition of things of space, becomes our sole concern.

Every State-formation, every assertion of the power of the magistrate, every mechanical means of compelling order and of guaranteeing a safe course of life is therefore always something unnatural;

Genius is a sovereign power; it forms schools; it lays hold on the spirits of men, with irresistible might; and it exercises an immeasurable influence on the whole condition of human life. This sovereignty of genius is a gift of God, possessed only by his grace. It is subject to no one and is responsible to him alone who has granted it this ascendancy.

all authority of governments on earth originates from the Sovereignty of God alone.

Public opinion in this country is everything.

Elections belong to the people. It's their decision. If they decide to turn their back on the fire and burn their behinds, then they will just have to sit on their blisters.

"The sun," said Mr. Bull, "never sets on English dominion. Do you understand how that is?" "oh, yes" said the Indian, "that is because God is afraid to trust them in the dark."