Motivational Quotes

Ideas

Whenever I hear people talking about liberal ideas, I am always astounded that men should love to fool themselves with empty sounds. An idea should never be liberal; it must be vigorous, positive, and without loose ends so that it may fulfill its divine mission and be productive. The proper place for liberality is in the realm of the emotions.

- Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

Best Quotes about Ideas

There are well-dressed foolish ideas, just as there are will-dressed fools.

Chamfort, Sebastien-Roch Nicolas De

The best ideas are common property.

Seneca

Go out and buy yourself a five-cent pencil and a ten-cent notebook and begin to write down some million-dollar ideas for yourself.

Grinde, Bob

In Texas, years ago, almost all of the oil came from surface operations. Then someone got the idea that there were greater sources of supply deeper down. A well was drilled five thousand feet deep. The result? A gusher. Too many of us operate on the surface. We never go deep enough to find supernatural resources. The result is, we never operate at our best. More time and investment is involved to go deep but a gusher will pay off.

Montapert, Alfred A.

A great idea is usually original to more than one discoverer. Great ideas come when the world needs them. Great ideas surround the world's ignorance and press for admission.

Phelps, Elizabeth Stuart

Great people talk about ideas. Small people talk about other people.

Gibson, Tobias S.

The idea is in my head to put it down is nothing.

Avery, Milton

It is a lesson which all history teaches wise men, to put trust in ideas, and not in circumstances.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Ideas are invented only as correctives to the past. Through repeated rectification of this kind one may hope to disengage an idea that is valid.

Bachelard, Gaston

10.

An idea is the only level which moves the world.

Corey, Arthur F.

11.

It's easy to come up with new ideas; the hard part is letting go of what worked for you two years ago, but will soon be out-of-date.

Oech, Roger Von

12.

Ideas can be life-changing. Sometimes all you need to open the door is just one more good idea.

Rohn, Jim

13.

A good idea plus capable men cannot fail; it is better than money in the bank.

Berry, John

14.

There are only two kinds of scholars; those who love ideas and those who hate them.

Emile Chartier

15.

The simple joy of taking an idea into one's own hands and giving it proper form, that's exciting.

Nelson, George

16.

People find ideas a bore because they do not distinguish between live ones and stuffed ones on a shelf.

Pound, Ezra

17.

To die for an idea; it is unquestionably noble. But how much nobler it would be if men died for ideas that were true!

H. L. Mencken

18.

It doesn't matter how new an idea is: what matters is how new it becomes.

Canetti, Elias

19.

Every new idea is an impossibility until it is born.

Brown, Ron

20.

But how shall I get ideas? Keep your wits open! Observe! Observe! Study! Study! But above all, Think! Think! And when a noble image is indelibly impressed upon the mind -- Act!

Marden, Orison Swett

21.

Ideas not coupled with action never become bigger than the brain cells they occupied.

Glasgow, Arnold H.

22.

You have to hatch ideas -- and then hitch them.

Everson, Ray D.

23.

A powerful idea communicates some of its strength to him who challenges it.

Proust, Marcel

24.

The ideas dictate everything, you have to be true to that or you're dead.

Lynch, David

25.

Ideas... they have the power

Hill, Napoleon

26.

We like to test things... no matter how good an idea sounds, test it first.

Block, Henry

27.

Once I thought ideas were exceptions not the rule. That is not so. Ideas are so plentiful that they ride by on air. You've only to reach out and snatch one...

Mckeun, Rod

28.

I'm not impressed with the power of a corporate president. I am impressed with the power of ideas.

Mason, Ken

29.

Harold, like the rest of us, had many impressions which saved him the trouble of distinct ideas.

Eliot, George

30.

If you pray for only one thing, .let it be for an idea.

Sutton, Percy

31.

The ideas of economists and political philosophers, both when they are right and when they are wrong, are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed the world is ruled by little else. Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist.

Keynes, John Maynard

32.

Don't worry about people stealing an idea. If it's original, you will have to ram it down their throats.

Howard Aiken

33.

An idea is a feat of association, and the height of it is a good metaphor.

Frost, Robert

34.

Such as take lodgings in a head that's to be let unfurnished.

Butler, Samuel

35.

It first appeared like a crazy idea. It turned out he had a great idea.

Munro, J. Richard

36.

I had a monumental idea this morning, but I didn't like it.

Samuel Goldwyn

37.

The way to combat noxious ideas is with other ideas. The way to combat falsehoods is with truth.

William O. Douglas

38.

It is not always by plugging away at a difficulty and sticking to it that one overcomes it; often it is by working on the one next to it. Some things and some people have to be approached obliquely, at an angle.

Gide, Andre

39.

Mere words are cheap and plenty enough, but ideas that rouse and set multitudes thinking come as gold for the mines.

Penny, A. Owen

40.

We are governed not by armies, but by ideas.

Caird, Mona

41.

It's very good for an idea to be commonplace. The important thing is that a new idea should develop out of what is already there so that it soon becomes an old acquaintance. Old acquaintances aren't by any means always welcome, but at least one can't be mistaken as to who or what they are.

Fitzgerald, Penelope

42.

All opening moves were the same, like in chess. You don't have to come up with anything new, there's no point, because you're both after the same thing anyway. The game soon finds its own way and it's only at that point that you need a strategy.

Paolo Giordano

43.

If you want to kill any idea in the world today, get a committee working on it.

Kettering, Charles F.

44.

Ideas won't work unless you do.

45.

So long as new ideas are created, sales will continue to reach new highs.

Brande, Dorothea

46.

The difference between people and ideas is... only superficial.

Rorty, Richard

47.

Every revolutionary idea seems to evoke three stages of reaction. They may be summed up by the phrases: (1) It's completely impossible. (2) It's possible, but it's not worth doing. (3) I said it was a good idea all along.

Clarke, Arthur C.

48.

If you want to get across an idea, wrap it up in a person.

Bunche, Ralph

49.

Long is the road from conception to completion.

Moliere

50.

The ideas of a time are like the clothes of a season: they are as arbitrary, as much imposed by some superior will which is seldom explicit. They are utilitarian and political, the instruments of smooth-running government.

Lewis, Wyndham