Famously Said Random quote

Quotes about failure

95 quotes from 79 people

Most readBy personPage 4 of 7

Every great mistake has a halfway moment, a split second when it can be recalled and perhaps remedied.
Pearl S. Buck1892–1973What America Means to Me (1943), Ch. 10
She had an unequalled gift, especially pen in hand, of squeezing big mistakes into small opportunities.
Henry James1843–1916“Greville Fane”, from The Real Thing: and Other Tales (1893)
- Clever Jabs
In the lexicon of youth, which fate reserves
For a bright manhood, there is no such word
As “fail”.
Edward Bulwer-Lytton1803–1873Richelieu (1839)
- Youth
We shall make mistakes; and if we let these mistakes frighten us from our work we shall show ourselves weaklings.
Theodore Roosevelt1858–1919National Duties (Speak Softly and Carry a Big Stick) (1901)
- Courage
Better have failed in the high aim, as I,
Than vulgarly in the low aim succeed,⁠—
As, God be thanked! I do not.
Robert Browning1812–1889Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)
- Success
I’m proof against that word failure. I’ve seen behind it. The only failure a man ought to fear is failure of cleaving to the purpose he sees to be best.
George Eliot1819–1880Felix Holt, the Radical (1866)
In archery we have something like the way of the superior man. When the archer misses the center of the target, he turns round and seeks for the cause of his failure in himself.
Confucius551–479 BCThe Doctrine of the Mean
- Responsibility
Our business in this world is not to succeed, but to continue to fail, in good spirits.
Robert Louis Stevenson1850–1894Complete Works, vol. 26, Reflections and Remarks on Human Life, section 4.
- Success
The condition of all progress is experience. We go wrong a thousand times before we find the right path.
Felix Adler1851–1933Life and Destiny (1913)
- Experience
All political lives, unless they are cut off in midstream at a happy juncture, end in failure, because that is the nature of politics and of human affairs.
Enoch Powell1912–1998Enoch Powell, Joseph Chamberlain (1977), p. 151
- Politics
Now a’ is done that men can do,
And a’ is done in vain.
Robert Burns1759–1796Johnson’s The Scots Musical Museum (1787–1796)
Every adversity has the seed of an equivalent or greater benefit.
Napoleon Hill1883–1970A maxim of Hill’s, specifically cited as such, in Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude (1960), co-authored with W. Clement Stone, Ch. 14, p. 222.
Oftentimes a reverse has but made room for more prosperous fortune.
Seneca the Younger5 BC–AD 65Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium (Moral Letters to Lucilius), Letter XCI: On the Lesson to be Drawn From the Burning of Lyons
- Luck
I once told you that I am not a saint, and I hope never to see the day that I cannot admit having made a mistake.
Gerald Ford1913–2006Address to Congress (12 August 1974)
We do not have to live the same mistakes over again if we can look at them, learn from them, and build upon them.
Audre Lorde1934–1992Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches (1984), “Learning from the 60s”
- Experience