The quotations of

Theodore Roosevelt

26th President of the United States from 1901 to 1909

1858–1919

75 quotes, most often on America, Politics and Success. Part of the U.S. Presidents collection.

Speak softly and carry a big stick.
Letter to Henry L. Sprague (26 January 1900)
To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public.
Kansas City Star (7 May 1918)
- America
- Politics
It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.
Citizenship in a Republic (1910)
Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.
The Strenuous Life (1899)
- Success
If I must choose between righteousness and peace, I choose righteousness.
America and the World War (1915)
- Morality
- War & Peace
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
Theodore Roosevelt — An Autobiography (1913), Ch. IX: Outdoors and Indoors, p. 336; the final statement “quoted by Squire Bill Widener” as well as variants of it, are often misattributed to Roosevelt himself.
Whenever you are asked if you can do a job, tell ‘em, ‘Certainly I can!’ Then get busy and find out how to do it.
- Work
Nothing in the world is worth having or worth doing unless it means effort, pain, difficulty… I have never in my life envied a human being who led an easy life. I have envied a great many people who led diffcult lives and led them well.
Address in Des Moines, Iowa (4 November 1910)
The things that will destroy America are prosperity at any price, peace at any price, safety first instead of duty first, the love of soft living and the get rich quick theory of life.
Letter to S. Stanwood Menken, chairman, committee on Congress of Constructive Patriotism (January 10, 1917). Roosevelt’s sister, Mrs. Douglas Robinson, read the letter to a national meeting, January 26, 1917
- America
Success, the real success, does not depend upon the position you hold but upon how you carry yourself in that position.
- Success
Far and away the best prize that life offers is the chance to work hard at work worth doing.
A Square Deal (1903)
- Work
Don’t hit at all if it is honorably possible to avoid hitting; but never hit soft!
- War & Peace
I keep my good health by having a very bad temper, kept under good control.
- Anger
The most important single ingredient in the formula of success is knowing how to get along with people.
- Success
When you play, play hard; when you work, don’t play at all.
- Work

Often credited to Theodore Roosevelt

Quotes often credited to Theodore Roosevelt that were said or written by someone else.

Absence and death are the same⁠—only that in death there is no suffering.
Walter Savage Landor1775–1864Often credited to Theodore Roosevelt
- Life & Death

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