quotations about action
In this country ... men seem to live for action as long as they can and sink into apathy when they retire.
CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS
diary, Apr. 15, 1836
Better remain silent, better not even think, if you are not prepared to act.
ANNIE BESANT
Encyclopedia Indica
Our deeds attach themselves to us like the flame to phosphorus. They constitute our brilliance, to be sure, but only in so far as they consume us.
ANDRE GIDE
Journals
Is it really so difficult to tell a good action from a bad one? I think one usually knows right away or a moment afterward, in a horrid flash of regret.
MARY MCCARTHY
My Confession
Actions are destiny's pen.
GRENVILLE KLEISER
Dictionary of Proverbs
The consequences of your actions aren't always clear until much later, and realizing you screwed up when it's already too late can hit hard.
ANDREW WEBSTER
"Life is Strange is my favorite TV show of the year -- except it's a video game", The Verge, October 28, 2015
When nothing hampers action, the soul has fewer reasons for action.
ROMAIN ROLLAND
Jean-Christophe
Men may boast of their great actions; but they are more often the effects of chance than of design.
FRANÇOIS DE LA ROCHEFOUCAULD
Moral Maxims
How shall not man, whose nature stands bound up with forces vast, innate with strength, reveal his life In mould of holiest cast. His law is action: gates of power stand open in his view; a restless soul, a holy zeal, shall give him entrance through.
D. WILLIAMS
"Action", The National Magazine, Dec. 1854
It is in vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquillity: they must have action; and they will make it if they cannot find it.
CHARLOTTE BRONTE
Jane Eyre
For intelligent people, action often means escape from thought, but it is a reasonable and a wise escape.
ANDRE MAUROIS
An Art of Living
When people believe you generally have their best interests at heart, you get the benefit of the doubt, and your actions are interpreted more generously.
HEIDI GRANT HALVORSON
"Signs You Might Be a Toxic Colleague", Harvard Business Review, March 2, 2016
So many of man's actions appear to have no immediate consequence but, concealed, do their work until finally all catches up and forms a complex web of cause and effect.
TOBSHA LEARNER
The Witch of Cologne
As a man believes, so he will act.
SAM HARRIS
The End of Faith
Action is but coarsened thought; thought become concrete, obscure, and unconscious.
HENRI-FREDERIC AMIEL
Journal Intime
I would say act like a man of thought and think like a man of action.
HENRI BERGSON
speech at the Descartes Conference in Paris, 1937
Potential is the good of life -- action the secret key.
D. WILLIAMS
"Action", The National Magazine, Dec. 1854
There is no action of man in this life that is not the beginning of so long a chain of consequences as no human providence is high enough to give a man a prospect in the end. And in this chain, there are linked together both pleasing and unpleasing events in such manner as he that will do anything for his pleasure must engage himself to suffer all the pains annexed to it.
THOMAS HOBBES
Leviathan
The mind sees, the will commands, the man acts. What is it then to act? To act is to produce something. If you have produced nothing--if no result has been the fruit of your will, you have done nothing.
HENRI-DOMINIQUE LACORDAIRE
God and Man: Conferences Delivered at Notre Dame in Paris by the Rev. Père Lacordaire
Let us do or die.
JOHN FLETCHER
The Island Princess