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.

A stream cannot rise larger than its source.
The only man who makes no mistakes is the man who never does anything.
- Failure
This country will not be a good place for any of us to live in unless we make it a good place for all of us to live in.
Chicago, IL (17 June 1912)
- America
If you could kick the person in the pants responsible for most of your trouble, you wouldn’t sit for a month.
A man who has never gone to school may steal from a freight car; but if he has a university education he may steal the whole railroad.
This truth should be kept constantly in mind by every free people desiring to preserve the sanity and poise indispensable to the permanent success of self-government.
The Man with the Muck Rake (1906)
- Truth & Lies
The forces that tend for evil are great and terrible, but the forces of truth and love and courage and honesty and generosity and sympathy are also stronger than ever before.
The Man with the Muck Rake (1906)
- Good & Evil
The fool who has not sense to discriminate between what is good and what is bad is well nigh as dangerous as the man who does discriminate and yet chooses the bad.
The Man with the Muck Rake (1906)
- Morality
We stand at Armageddon and we battle for the Lord.
Speech at Progressive Party Convention, Chicago (17 June 1912)
- Politics
In short, in life, as in a football game, the principle to follow is: Hit the line hard; don’t foul and don’t shirk, but hit the line hard!
“The American Boy”, published in St. Nicholas 27, no. 7 (May 1900), p. 574
- Football
- Life & Death
It is a bad thing for a nation to raise and to admire a false standard of success; and there can be no falser standard than that set by the deification of material well-being in and for itself.
Citizenship in a Republic (The Man in the Arena) (1910)
- Money
- Success
We cannot avoid meeting great issues. All that we can determine for ourselves is whether we shall meet them well or ill.
The Strenuous Life (1899)
- Courage
I can be President of the United States, or I can control Alice. I cannot possibly do both.
Response when a dignitary asked if he could better control his daughter, as quoted in Hail to the Chiefs : My Life and Times with Six Presidents (1970) by Ruth Shick Montgomery, and TIME magazine (3 March 1980)
- Children
- Presidency
The government is us; we are the government, you and I.
Speech at Asheville, North Carolina (9 September 1902)
- Democracy
- Government
It is true of the Nation, as of the individual, that the greatest doer must also be a great dreamer.
Berkeley, CA (1911)
- Motivation & Goals

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