I.B. George Quotes

I hope I'm as graceful and gracious as [my parents] are. It's hard for me to project how I'm gonna be if I make it to 86.

Important part of our diplomacy is that people take our words seriously.

We hope that diplomacy works before you ever use force. The hardest decision a president makes is ever to use force.

I gleaned more practical psychology and psychiatry from the Bible, than from all other books!

A child regards your cheery smile as evidence that you are on his side, so he relaxes and is happier.

Only positive consequences encourage good future performances.

Lincoln would be just like me. He wouldn't know what the hell to do.

There is not much danger of the smaller nations if the big nations will behave.

It is morally, politically and socially wrong for business as business or labor as labor to participate directly in politics.

You can't be too right too soon and win elections.

My wife has been my greatest earthly inspiration. She excels in eloquence, the poetry of words, empathy and graciousness.

The idea of choice is easily debased if one forgets that the aim is to have chosen successfully, not to be endlessly choosing.

A scientist should be the happiest of men.

It is one of the evils of democratical governments, that the people, not always seeing and frequently misled, must often feel before they can act.

The tumultuous populace of large cities are ever to be dreaded. Their indiscriminate violence prostrates for the time all public authority, and its consequences are sometimes extensive and terrible.

The Independence and Liberty you possess are the work of joint councils and joint efforts, of common dangers, sufferings and successes.

Sleep not when others speak, sit not when others stand, speak not when you should hold your peace, walk not when others stop.

I wish from my soul that the legislature of this State could see the policy of a gradual Abolition of Slavery.

One of his officers, Henry Lee, summed up contemporary public opinion of Washington: First in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen.

Avoiding occasions of expense by cultivating peace, we should remember also that timely disbursements to prepare for danger frequently prevent much greater disbursements to repel it

Be easy and condescending in your deportment to your officers, but not too familiar, lest you subject yourself to a want of respect, which is necessary to support a proper command.

The most certain way to make a man your enemy is to tell him you esteem him such.

As the first of every thing, in our situation will serve to establish a Precedent, it is devoutly wished on my part, that these precedents may be fixed on true principles.

Reason, too late perhaps, may convince you of the folly of misspending time.

The foundation of our national policy will be laid in the pure and immutable principle of private morality.

I have the consolation to believe, that, while choice and prudence invite me to quit the political scene, patriotism does not forbid it.

[Avoid] likewise the accumulation of debt.

I die hard but am not afraid to go.

The investigation of mathematical truths accustoms the mind to method and correctness in reasoning, and is an employment peculiarly worthy of rational beings.

Because of this ever increasing discernment of the true Mason he/she will find more efficient ways to apply brotherly love, relief and truth.

A variety in punishment is of utility, as well as a proportion.

A bad war is fought with a good mind.

My ardent desire is... to keep the United States free from political connexions with every other Country. To see that they may be independent of all, and under the influence of none.

Our country's honor calls upon us for a vigorous and manly exertion; and if we now shamefully fail, we shall become infamous to the whole world.

I never say anything of a man that I have the smallest scruple of saying to him.

I'm really not an avowed heterosexual. I'm no more proud of it than of being white or tall.

If you do not understand what God's present claims over you are, you may depend upon it that as days of testing come on you will not be able to keep your footing.

For Conservatives, seeing is believing; for liberals, believing is seeing.

I am opposed to term limits because if we did not have seasoned professionals, we would not have the good government that we have.

I don't think anyone has ever announced running for president that they want to change the Bill of Rights.

Since 1946, the Cubs have had two problems: They put too few runs on the scoreboard and the other guys put too many. So what is the new management improving? The scoreboard.

Criticism is not construction, it is observation.

Our common liberty is consecrated by a common sorrow.

I've played for crowds as small as 30 people. As long as people want to see me play then I'll perform.

Little said is soonest mended.

It's better to break a man's leg than his heart.

Progress is a tension between the notion of perfection and the notion that striving, not finding, is important.

Probably saying a 30-second prayer at a key moment has done more good than any psychotherapy or drugs I've prescribed.

It is not the business of government to make men virtuous or religious, or to preserve the fool from the consequences of his own folly.

As it is with an individual, so it is with a nation. One must produce to have, or one will become a have-not.