Motivational Quotes

Ideas

Never hesitate to steal a good idea.

- Neuharth, Al

Best Quotes about Ideas

The point, simply, is that we are doing more rediscovering these days than discovering coming anew upon truths that ignorant people refused to examine, over the centuries, because the wise people who held custody of the fundamental truths of nature were unpopular.

Williamson, John

Man's mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions.

Oliver Wendell Holmes

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

Eliot, George

Ideas won't work unless you do.

Ideas control the world.

Garfield, James A.

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

Proust, Marcel

It's a pretty good idea to be of good cheer but not all the time. Just at the most unexpected times.

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

William O. Douglas

A single idea, if it is right, saves us the labor of an infinity of experiences.

Maritain, Jacques

10.

A mind once stretched by a new idea never regains its original dimensions.

Holmes, Oliver Wendell

11.

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

12.

Ideas lose themselves as quickly as quail, and one must wing them the minute they rise out of the grass, or they are gone.

Kennedy, Thomas F.

13.

An idea is a putting truth in check-mate.

Gasset, Jose Ortega Y

14.

We are not to make the ideas of contentment and aspiration quarrel, for God made them fast friends. A man may aspire, and yet be quite content until it is time to raise; and both flying and resting are but parts of one contentment. The very fruit of the gospel is aspiration. It is to the heart what spring is to the earth, making every root, and bud, and bough desire to be more. -

Beecher, Henry Ward

15.

Sometimes the best, and only effective, way to kill an idea is to put it into practice.

Harris, Sidney J.

16.

A handsome parson is fit for nothing but ti put ideas into the young woman's heads.

Judith Brocklehurst

17.

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

Butler, Samuel

18.

Ideas... they have the power

Hill, Napoleon

19.

The vitality of thought is in adventure. Ideas won't keep. Something must be done about them.

Alfred North Whitehead

20.

When patterns are broken, new worlds can emerge.

Kupferberg, Tuli

21.

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.

22.

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

Samuel Goldwyn

23.

Ideas are refined and multiplied in the commerce of minds. In their splendor, images effect a very simple communion of souls.

Bachelard, Gaston

24.

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

Kettering, Charles F.

25.

He was distinguished for ignorance; for he had only one idea, and that was wrong.

Disraeli, Benjamin

26.

A pile of rocks ceases to be a rock when somebody contemplates it with the idea of a cathedral in mind.

Saint-Exupery, Antoine De

27.

Ideas move fast when their time comes.

Heilbrun, Carolyn

28.

Ideas are a capital that bears interest only in the hands of talent.

Rivarol, Antoine

29.

Ideas are the roots of creation.

Dimnet, Ernest

30.

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

31.

Some people entertain ideas; others put them to work.

32.

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

33.

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

Rorty, Richard

34.

A man is not necessarily intelligent because he has plenty of ideas, any more than he is a good general because he has plenty of soldiers.

Chamfort, Sebastien-Roch Nicolas De

35.

Do not follow the ideas of others, but learn to listen to the voice within yourself. Your body and mind will become clear and you will realize the unity of all things.

Dogen

36.

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

Gibson, Tobias S.

37.

Brain cells create ideas. Stress kills brain cells. Stress is not a good idea.

Saunders, Richard

38.

Take the obvious, add a cupful of brains, a generous pinch of imagination, a bucketful of courage and daring, stir well and bring to a boil.

Baruch, Bernard M.

39.

Ideas are powerful things, requiring not a studious contemplation but an action, even if it is only an inner action. Their acquisition obligates each man in some way to change his life, even if it is only his inner life. They demand to be stood for. They dictate where a man must concentrate his vision. They determine his moral and intellectual priorities. They provide him with allies and make him enemies. In short, ideas impose an interest in their ultimate fate which goes far beyond the realm of the merely reasonable.

Decter, Midge

40.

Ideas that enter the mind under fire remain there securely and for ever.

Trotsky, Leon

41.

Nothing dies harder than a bad idea.

Cameron, Julie

42.

Many ideas are good for a limited time -- not forever.

Townsend, Robert

43.

Man's mind, stretched by a new idea, never goes back to its original dimensions.

Holmes, Oliver Wendell

44.

Concepts, like individuals, have their histories and are just as incapable of withstanding the ravages of time as are individuals. But in and through all this they retain a kind of homesickness for the scenes of their childhood.

Kierkegaard, S°ren

45.

The human mind treats a new idea the same way the body treats a strange protein; it rejects it.

P. B. Medawar

46.

All achievements, all earned riches, have their beginning in an idea.

Hill, Napoleon

47.

Many ideas grow better when transplanted into another mind than in the one where they sprung up.

Holmes, Oliver Wendell

48.

The best ideas are common property.