Power Quotes
 
|
More Power Quotes
Knowledge will give you power, but character respect.
bruce lee— Striking Thoughts (2000, p. 46)
Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.
Abraham Lincoln
I believe there's an inner power that makes winners or losers. And the winners are the ones who really listen to the truth of their hearts.
Sylvester Stallone
What is called music today is all too often only a disguise for the monologue of power. However, and this is the supreme irony of it all, never before have musicians tried so hard to communicate with their audience, and never before has that communication been so deceiving. Music now seems hardly more than a somewhat clumsy excuse for the self-glorification of musicians and the growth of a new industrial sector.
Jacques Attali— As quoted in Classic Essays on Twentieth-Century Music
I am not interested in power for power's sake, but I'm interested in power that is moral, that is right and that is good.
Martin Luther King Jr.— As quoted in The Civil Sphere (2006) by Jeffrey C. Alexander, p. 388
Power is given only to him who dares to stoop and take it... one must have the courage to dare.
fyodor dostoevsky— Crime and Punishment (1866), part 5, chapter 4 (translated by David Magarshak).
WITH GREAT POWER THERE MUST ALSO COME—GREAT RESPONSIBILITY!
stan lee— Amazing Fantasy #15 (August 1962) – The first Spider-Man story.
— In later stories and adaptations, including the 2002 movie, this has appeared as "With great power comes great responsibility."
— The saying pre-dates Amazing Fantasy. A UK Member of Parliament implied in 1817 that a variant of it was already a cliché (Thomas C. Hansard, ed (1817). Parliamentary Debates. p. 1227. Retrieved on October 10, 2013. "He should, however, beg leave to remind the conductors of the press of their duty to apply to themselves a maxim which they never neglected to urge on the consideration of government—'that the possession of great power necessarily implies great responsibility.'" The editor is quoting William Lamb (pp. 1125–1229)). The sentiment is also found in Luke 12:48: "from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked" (NIV).
Some Blockett-type employees actually believe that they have received a genuine promotion; others recognize the truth. But the main function of a pseudo-promotion is to deceive people outside the hierarchy. When this is achieved, the maneuver is counted a success.
Laurence J. Peter— The Peter Principle (1969, pg. 38): This phenomenon is called by Peter "percussive sublimation", or "being kicked upstairs".
You must build your House of Parliament on the river: so... that the populace cannot exact their demands by sitting down round you.
1st duke of wellington— As quoted in Words on Wellington (1889), by Sir William Fraser, p. 163.
All power corrupts, absolute power is even more fun.
— Simon Travaglia, The Operator From Hell Part 2 (1997)
The awful shadow of some unseen Power Floats, tho' unseen, amongst us.
Percy Bysshe Shelley— Percy Bysshe Shelley, Hymn to Intellectual Beauty
I thought that my invincible power would hold the world captive, leaving me in a freedom undisturbed. Thus night and day I worked at the chain with huge fires and cruel hard strokes. When at last the work was done and the links were complete and unbreakable, I found that it held me in its grip.
rabindranath tagore— Rabindranath Tagore, Gitanjali, 31
There is no power on earth that can undo Pakistan.
muhammad ali jinnah— Speech at a rally at the University Stadium, Lahore (30 October 1947)
Odin, thou whirlwind, what a threat is this Thou threatenest what transcends thy might, even thine, For of all powers the mightiest far art thou, Lord over men on earth, and Gods in Heaven; Yet even from thee thyself hath been withheld One thing to undo what thou thyself hast ruled.
Matthew Arnold— Matthew Arnold, Balder Dead, The Funeral
All things that move between the quiet poles Shall be at my command: emperors and kings Are but obeyed in their several provinces, Nor can they raise the wind, or rend the clouds; But his dominion that exceeds in this Stretcheth as far as doth the mind of man; A sound magician is a demi-god.
Christopher Marlowe— Doctor Faustus (c.1592 , published1604), act 1, scene 1.
Greatness by nature includes a power, but not a will to power. ... The great man, whether we comprehend him in the most intense activity of his work or in the restful equipoise of his forces , is powerful, involuntarily and composedly powerful, but he is not avid for power. What he is avid for is the realization of what he has in mind , the incarnation of the spirit .
— Martin Buber, criticizing Friedrich Nietzsche's concept of "Will to Power," Between Man and Man (1965), p. 150
Dim with the mist of years, gray flits the shade of power.
lord byron— Lord Byron, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, Canto II (1812), Stanza 2
Domination is not that solid and global kind of domination that one person exercises over others, or one group over another, but the manifold forms of domination that can be exercised within society.
— Michel Foucault, in The History of Sexuality, p.96
One should try to locate power at the extreme of its exercise, where it is always less legal in character.
— Michel Foucault, in The History of Sexuality, p.97
Nonviolent action involves opposing the opponent's power, including his police & military capacity, not with the weapons chosen by him but by quite different means...Repression by the opponent is used against his own power position in a kind of political " ju-jitsu " and the very sources of his power thus reduced or removed, with the result that his political and military position is seriously weakened or destroyed.
— Gene Sharp, The Politics of Nonviolent Action, Part Three: The Dynamics of Nonviolent Action, Porter Sargent, 1973, (p. 453)
No pent-up Utica contracts your powers, But the whole boundless continent is yours.
Jonathan Sewall— Epilogue to Addison's Cato, written for the performance at the Bow Street Theatre, Portsmouth, New Hampshire.
An untoward event. (Threatening to disturb the balance of power.)
— Duke of Wellington, on the destruction of the Turkish Navy at the battle of Navarino (Oct. 20, 1827)
The media's the most powerful entity on earth. They have the power to make the innocent guilty and to make the guilty innocent, and that's power. Because they control the minds of the masses.
Malcolm X originally Malcolm Little— Malcolm X, in The Awakening of Global Consciousness: A Guide to Self-Realization and ..., p.199
You can’t win, Darth. If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.
Obi-Wan Kenobi— Played by Alec Guinness in Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (1977).
