Quotes on Power

Power is always dangerous. Power attracts the worst and corrupts the best.

Author: Edward Abbey

I welcome him like I welcome cold sores. He's from England, he's angry and he's got Mad Power Disease.

Author: Paula Abdul

People desire power. I don't know why they want it so. It seems to me it implies a hugely superior intellect which separates them from most of the populace.

Author: F. Abraham

Woody Allen sets are very quiet. Extraordinary sense of power from a man who doesn't do anything except just stand there.

Author: F. Abraham

One of the reasons I think the ultra right-wing has such power in this country is that no one talks out.

Author: Kathy Acker

India is a regional power. It does not need anything to establish it.

Author: Gary Ackerman

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Author: John Acton

Liberty is not the power of doing what we like, but the right to do what we ought.

Author: Lord Acton

Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Author: Lord Acton

Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Author: Lord Acton

Arbitrary power is like most other things which are very hard, very liable to be broken.

Author: Abigail Adams

I am more and more convinced that man is a dangerous creature and that power, whether vested in many or a few, is ever grasping, and like the grave, cries, 'Give, give.'

Author: Abigail Adams

Appreciate the power of rumor, often malicious, no matter how preposterous, within the local populations you are seeking to help.

Author: Alvin Adams

In this context the British and Irish governments will have to promote a new, imaginative and dynamic alternative in which both governments will share power in the north.

Author: Gerry Adams

Power is poison. Its effect on Presidents had always been tragic.

Author: Henry Adams

Power when wielded by abnormal energy is the most serious of facts.

Author: Henry Adams

A friend in power is a friend lost.

Author: Henry Adams

Because power corrupts, society's demands for moral authority and character increase as the importance of the position increases.

Author: John Adams

Power always thinks... that it is doing God's service when it is violating all his laws.

Author: John Adams

Power always thinks it has a great soul and vast views beyond the comprehension of the weak.

Author: John Adams

Liberty, according to my metaphysics is a self-determining power in an intellectual agent. It implies thought and choice and power.

Author: John Adams

Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud, is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people.

Author: John Adams

Nothing is more gratifying to the mind of man than power or dominion.

Author: Joseph Addison

No one can fail to see that the power of the Church among large numbers in many communities is today diminishing, or has already ceased.

Author: Felix Adler

Stripped of ethical rationalizations and philosophical pretensions, a crime is anything that a group in power chooses to prohibit.

Author: Freda Adler

The good man is he who rules himself as he does his own property: his autonomous being is modelled on material power.

Author: Theodor Adorno

The almost insoluble task is to let neither the power of others, nor our own powerlessness, stupefy us.

Author: Theodor Adorno

Whoever is new to power is always harsh.

Author: Aeschylus

The American people should be made aware of the trend toward monopolization of the great public information vehicles and the concentration of more and more power over public opinion in fewer and fewer hands.

Author: Spiro Agnew

The United States' administrations... must recognize that Iran is a big power. Having said that, we consider ourselves to be a human force and a cultural power and hence a friend of other nations. We have never sought to dominate others or to violate the rights of any other country.

Author: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

My mother taught me that we all have the power to achieve our dreams. What I lacked was the courage.

Author: Clay Aiken

When virtue and modesty enlighten her charms, the lustre of a beautiful woman is brighter than the stars of heaven, and the influence of her power it is in vain to resist.

Author: Akhenaton

You in Lebanon, your power is no match to Israel. Israel, militarily, is more powerful than you and maybe it is more powerful than all the Arab countries, or most of them.

Author: Bashar al-Assad

You have a good many little gifts and virtues, but there is no need of parading them, for conceit spoils the finest genius. There is not much danger that real talent or goodness will be overlooked long, and the great charm of all power is modesty.

Author: Louisa Alcott

Conceit spoils the finest genius. There is not much danger that real talent or goodness will be overlooked long; even if it is, the consciousness of possessing and using it well should satisfy one, and the great charm of all power is modesty.

Author: Louisa Alcott

Only a man who knows what it is like to be defeated can reach down to the bottom of his soul and come up with the extra ounce of power it takes to win when the match is even.

Author: Muhammad Ali

Power is not only what you have but what the enemy thinks you have.

Author: Saul Alinsky

Always remember the first rule of power tactics; power is not only what you have but what the enemy thinks you have.

Author: Saul Alinsky

The more tranquil a man becomes, the greater is his success, his influence, his power for good. Calmness of mind is one of the beautiful jewels of wisdom.

Author: James Allen

A skilled Transition Team leader will set the general goals for a Transition, and then confer on the other team leaders working with him the power to implement those goals.

Author: Richard Allen

The 'transition' involves the transfer of power from one president to another. In recent times, the incoming President has designated a Director of the Transition, a team leader, to oversee and administer the orderly transfer of power.

Author: Richard Allen

I have a profound belief in the power of the Sacraments. I believe that in a Divine way the use of them teaches the teachable their inward meaning and therefore I think we need be in no hurry to attempt to teach new converts all that we think we know about them.

Author: Roland Allen

Mercury pollution from power plants is a national problem that requires a national response.

Author: Tom Allen

I'm aware of the mystery around us, so I write about coincidences, premonitions, emotions, dreams, the power of nature, magic.

Author: Isabel Allende

What I fear most is power with impunity. I fear abuse of power, and the power to abuse.

Author: Isabel Allende

I believe I am the highest power, absolutely.

Author: GG Allin

About seven years later I was given a book about the periodic table of the elements. For the first time I saw the elegance of scientific theory and its predictive power.

Author: Sidney Altman

Johnson had been the most powerful man in the world, yet the North Vietnamese and the Vietcong had resisted, overcome his power, broken his will.

Author: Stephen Ambrose

Order is power.

Author: Henri Amiel

I don't think we would have had to be an occupying power if we had done the right thing in 1991.

Author: Jon Anderson

A lot of the work in United States is highly critical of technology. I'm using 15,000 watts of power and 18 different pieces of electronic equipment to say that.

Author: Laurie Anderson

Power tires only those who do not have it.

Author: Giulio Andreotti

Power wears out those who don't have it.

Author: Giulio Andreotti

The older I get, the greater power I seem to have to help the world; I am like a snowball - the further I am rolled the more I gain.

Author: Susan Anthony

As I came to power peacefully, so shall I keep it.

Author: Corazon Aquino

The media's power is frail. Without the people's support, it can be shut off with the ease of turning a light switch.

Author: Corazon Aquino

It is true you cannot eat freedom and you cannot power machinery with democracy. But then neither can political prisoners turn on the light in the cells of a dictatorship.

Author: Corazon Aquino

I was allowed to ring the bell for five minutes until everyone was in assembly. It was the beginning of power.

Author: Jeffrey Archer

Power and violence are opposites; where the one rules absolutely, the other is absent. Violence appears where power is in jeopardy, but left to its own course it ends in power's disappearance.

Author: Hannah Arendt

Revolutionaries do not make revolutions. The revolutionaries are those who know when power is lying in the street and then they can pick it up.

Author: Hannah Arendt

Yes, across the board, these gentlemen understand they have the power to make a difference and even educate people to injustices that are occurring in their worlds.

Author: Alexis Arguello

I'd take precision any day over power; as far as being tactical you know you have to see what's going on in there and also understand that for every punch that you or your opponent throws there's always a counter shot or two which you have to be ready to fire or defend.

Author: Alexis Arguello

The one exclusive sign of thorough knowledge is the power of teaching.

Author: Aristotle

What it lies in our power to do, it lies in our power not to do.

Author: Aristotle

Anybody can become angry - that is easy, but to be angry with the right person and to the right degree and at the right time and for the right purpose, and in the right way - that is not within everybody's power and is not easy.

Author: Aristotle

A sense is what has the power of receiving into itself the sensible forms of things without the matter, in the way in which a piece of wax takes on the impress of a signet-ring without the iron or gold.

Author: Aristotle

In a democracy the poor will have more power than the rich, because there are more of them, and the will of the majority is supreme.

Author: Aristotle

The war we are fighting today against terrorism is a multifaceted fight. We have to use every tool in our toolkit to wage this war - diplomacy, finance, intelligence, law enforcement, and of course, military power - and we are developing new tools as we go along.

Author: Richard Armitage

For the creation of a masterwork of literature two powers must concur, the power of the man and the power of the moment, and the man is not enough without the moment.

Author: Matthew Arnold

The power of one, if fearless and focused, is formidable, but the power of many working together is better.

Author: Gloria Arroyo

My second job has been to try to use my power to create institutions of a modern state that could enter the European Union, and there was very little time. The door was closing, and I wanted to get Bosnia through before it shut.

Author: Paddy Ashdown

My power is the ability to control water molecules and form them into ice.

Author: Shawn Ashmore

The scum of the People are most Tyrannical when they get the Power, and treat their Betters with the greatest Insolence.

Author: Mary Astell

A word after a word after a word is power.

Author: Margaret Atwood

You have power over your mind - not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.

Author: Marcus Aurelius

To live happily is an inward power of the soul.

Author: Marcus Aurelius

There is nothing happens to any person but what was in his power to go through with.

Author: Marcus Aurelius

We have established a new basis in our country in which economic liberalization would continue to flourish alongside democratic forces and deregulated power structure.

Author: Ibrahim Babangida

A tool is usually more simple than a machine; it is generally used with the hand, whilst a machine is frequently moved by animal or steam power.

Author: Charles Babbage

Another mode of accumulating power arises from lifting a weight and then allowing it to fall.

Author: Charles Babbage

Perhaps as good a classification as any of the main types is that of the three lusts distinguished by traditional Christianity - the lust of knowledge, the lust of sensation, and the lust of power.

Author: Irving Babbitt

The highest proof of virtue is to possess boundless power without abusing it.

Author: Thomas Babington

You are never given a wish without also being given the power to make it come true. You may have to work for it, however.

Author: Richard Bach

You are never given a wish without being given the power to make it true. You may have to work for it, however.

Author: Richard Bach

Knowledge is power.

Author: Francis Bacon

Knowledge and human power are synonymous.

Author: Francis Bacon

It is a strange desire, to seek power, and to lose liberty; or to seek power over others, and to lose power over a man's self.

Author: Francis Bacon

I would say invisibility would be sort of a fun power to have just to see what it was like to move through the world and not be looked at.

Author: Kevin Bacon

In our story logic which we're making up, if we're saying he's alive, then like a quadriplegic who's in bed he can move his head and shoulders, but he can't move his arms. If he could just turn on that power to his legs and arms, the nerves could get through and he could walk.

Author: John Badham

Threats without power are like powder without ball.

Author: Nathan Bailey

By a great man, however, we mean a man who, because of his spiritual gifts, his character, and other qualities, deserves to be called great and who as a result earns the power to influence others.

Author: Fredrik Bajer

Until a friend or relative has applied a particular proverb to your own life, or until you've watched him apply the proverb to his own life, it has no power to sway you.

Author: Nicholson Baker

Ah, summer, what power you have to make us suffer and like it.

Author: Russell Baker

It is certain, in any case, that ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have.

Author: James Baldwin

But the relationship of morality and power is a very subtle one. Because ultimately power without morality is no longer power.

Author: James Baldwin

Power is action; the electoral principle is discussion. No political action is possible when discussion is permanently established.

Author: Honore Balzac

Power is not revealed by striking hard or often, but by striking true.

Author: Honore Balzac

There is no such thing as a great talent without great will power.

Author: Honore Balzac

I am not afraid of much. I kill all the spiders in my house, and I'm planning to go skydiving. I am into girl power, and I'm very self-sufficient.

Author: Elizabeth Banks

I think the touchstone is to give consumers a full, fair choice without the power of a monopoly operating system pushing them in a direction that free competition might or might not achieve.

Author: Jim Barksdale

I call the discourse of power any discourse that engenders blame, hence guilt, in its recipient.

Author: Roland Barthes

Language is legislation, speech is its code. We do not see the power which is in speech because we forget that all speech is a classification, and that all classifications are oppressive.

Author: Roland Barthes

Individual investors have become far more powerful than anyone gives them credit for. Today, 85 million Americans invest in stocks. Collectively, that kind of buying and selling power can move markets.

Author: Maria Bartiromo

Not the power to remember, but its very opposite, the power to forget, is a necessary condition for our existence.

Author: Saint Basil

In the same way that we need statesmen to spare us the abjection of exercising power, we need scholars to spare us the abjection of learning.

Author: Jean Baudrillard

All the idols made by man, however terrifying they may be, are in point of fact subordinate to him, and that is why he will always have it in his power to destroy them.

Author: Simone Beauvoir

Global conditions are far too complex to be able to imagine that they could ever be really controlled by one power.

Author: Ulrich Beck

The world has become so complex that the idea of a power in which everything comes together and can be controlled in a centralized way is now erroneous.

Author: Ulrich Beck

A man's true state of power and riches is to be in himself.

Author: Henry Beecher

I think Bush has a very selfish, arrogant point of view. I think he is interested in power, I think he believes his truth is the only truth, and that he will do what he wants to do despite the people.

Author: Harry Belafonte

What this power is I cannot say; all I know is that it exists and it becomes available only when a man is in that state of mind in which he knows exactly what he wants and is fully determined not to quit until he finds it.

Author: Alexander Bell

The American people do not begrudge anyone his or her power until they start abusing it.

Author: Chris Bell

Those who are leftists, once in power, are not different from other parties.

Author: Ahmed Bella

Che came in 1963, shortly after I had come to power.

Author: Ahmed Bella

With the power of conviction, there is no sacrifice.

Author: Pat Benatar

The power of the lawyer is in the uncertainty of the law.

Author: Jeremy Bentham

The bourgeois takes economic power very seriously, and often worships it.

Author: Nicolai Berdyaev

In a market economy, however, the individual has some possibility of escaping from the power of the state.

Author: Peter Berger

Our attitudes control our lives. Attitudes are a secret power working twenty-four hours a day, for good or bad. It is of paramount importance that we know how to harness and control this great force.

Author: Irving Berlin

The purpose of getting power is to be able to give it away.

Author: Aneurin Bevan

Do not allow yourself to imagine that revolutionary thinking can be propagated by governmental power.

Author: Vinoba Bhave

If a man achieves victory over this body, who in the world can exercise power over him? He who rules himself rules over the whole world.

Author: Vinoba Bhave

This nuclear option is ultimately an example of the arrogance of power.

Author: Joe Biden

Eulogy. Praise of a person who has either the advantages of wealth and power, or the consideration to be dead.

Author: Ambrose Bierce

Clairvoyant, n.: A person, commonly a woman, who has the power of seeing that which is invisible to her patron - namely, that he is a blockhead.

Author: Ambrose Bierce

Beauty, n: the power by which a woman charms a lover and terrifies a husband.

Author: Ambrose Bierce

Vote: the instrument and symbol of a freeman's power to make a fool of himself and a wreck of his country.

Author: Ambrose Bierce

If we are to meet the growing electricity demand in the United States without significantly increasing emissions of greenhouse gases, we must maintain a diverse supply of electricity, and nuclear power must be part of that mix.

Author: Judy Biggert

All too often arrogance accompanies strength, and we must never assume that justice is on the side of the strong. The use of power must always be accompanied by moral choice.

Author: Theodore Bikel

Major North has had for years complete power over these Indians and can do more with them than any man living.

Author: Buffalo Bill

There's a great power in words, if you don't hitch too many of them together.

Author: Josh Billings

When a guy can make fun of you, thats attractive. Who knew that teasing could have so much power over women!

Author: Rachel Bilson

Books, I found, had the power to make time stand still, retreat or fly into the future.

Author: Jim Bishop

You must never underestimate the power of the eyebrow.

Author: Jack Black

Wake the power within thee slumbering, trim the plot that's in thy keeping, thou wilt bless the task when reaping sweet labour's prize.

Author: John Blackie

Even though mother's issues are not front page news, they touch us all personally, some more than others, and I believe passionately in the power of grassroots engagement.

Author: Joan Blades

People always joke that "dog" spells "god" backwards. They should consider that it might be the higher power coming down to see just how well they do, what kind of people they are. The animals are right here, right in front of us. And how we treat these companions is a test.

Author: Linda Blair

In the past a leader was a boss. Today's leaders must be partners with their people... they no longer can lead solely based on positional power.

Author: Ken Blanchard

It was only when I realized how actors have the power to move people that I decided to pursue acting as a career.

Author: Cate Blanchett

FIFA's goal of making the world a better place through football cannot be achieved through our efforts alone - equally important is the power which every fan of the beautiful game has at their disposal.

Author: Sepp Blatter

We kind of agree with Mao that political power comes largely from the barrel of a gun. And we get it that if you want a friend you should get a dog.

Author: Ron Bloom

The spirit and determination of the people to chart their own destiny is the greatest power for good in human affairs.

Author: Matt Blunt

I shuddered to think how completely the insane were in the power of their keepers, and how one could weep and plead for release, and all of no avail, if the keepers were so minded.

Author: Nellie Bly

Film provides an opportunity to marry the power of ideas with the power of images.

Author: Steven Bochco

The value of the majority lies not in the opportunity to wield great power, but in the chance to use power to do great things.

Author: John Boehner

The large venue gives me the thrill that comes from the power in numbers.

Author: Suzy Bogguss

The power of the ballot we need in sheer defense, else what shall save us from a second slavery?

Author: W. Bois

We are all, in a sense, experts on secrecy. From earliest childhood we feel its mystery and attraction. We know both the power it confers and the burden it imposes. We learn how it can delight, give breathing space and protect.

Author: Sissela Bok

Power is my mistress. I have worked too hard at her conquest to allow anyone to take her away from me.

Author: Napoleon Bonaparte

One should never forbid what one lacks the power to prevent.

Author: Napoleon Bonaparte