Power Quotes

No emperor has the power to dictate to the heart.
– Friedrich Schiller
Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud, is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people.
– John Quincy Adams
Never underestimate the power of the State to act out its own massive fantasies.
– Don DeLillo
Never go backward. Attempt, and do it with all your might. Determination is power.
– Charles Simmons
Never allow a person to tell you no who doesn't have the power to say yes.
– Eleanor Roosevelt
Mystical references to society and its programs to help may warm the hearts of the gullible but what it really means is putting more power in the hands of bureaucrats.
– Thomas Sowell
My relationship to power and authority is that I'm all for it. People need somebody to watch over them. Ninety-five percent of the people in the world need to be told what to do and how to behave.
– Arnold Schwarzenegger
Most critical writing is drivel and half of it is dishonest. It is a short cut to oblivion, anyway. Thinking in terms of ideas destroys the power to think in terms of emotions and sensations.
– Raymond Chandler
More than ever before, consumers have the ability to unify their voices and coalesce their buying power to influence corporate behaviors.
– Simon Mainwaring
Mischief springs from the power which the moneyed interest derives from a paper currency which they are able to control, from the multitude of corporations with exclusive privileges... which are employed altogether for their benefit.
– Andrew Jackson
Militant feminists are pro-choice because it's their ultimate avenue of power over men. And believe me, to them it is a question of power. It is their attempt to impose their will on the rest of society, particularly on men.
– Rush Limbaugh
Men should think twice before making widowhood woman's only path to power.
– Gloria Steinem
Master of the universe but not of myself, I am the only rebel against my absolute power.
– Pierre Corneille
Many have said of Alchemy, that it is for the making of gold and silver. For me such is not the aim, but to consider only what virtue and power may lie in medicines.
– Philipus Aureolus Paracelsus
Machines are worshipped because they are beautiful and valued because they confer power they are hated because they are hideous and loathed because they impose slavery.
– Bertrand Russell
Life is suffering. Life is not resistance to suffering. The point of life is to suffer. This is why we're here: We're here to suffer. I believe in a higher power that compassionately allows suffering for us as a race, to grow and mature.
– Rainn Wilson
Liberty is not the power of doing what we like, but the right to do what we ought.
– Lord Acton
Lessons of wisdom have the most power over us when they capture the heart through the groundwork of a story, which engages the passions.
– Laurence Sterne
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.
– Roland Barthes
Knowing that you are completely forgiven destroys the power of sin in your life.
– Joseph Prince
King's response to our crisis can be put in one word: revolution. A revolution in our priorities, a reevaluation of our values, a reinvigoration of our public life and a fundamental transformation of our way of thinking and living that promotes a transfer of power from oligarchs and plutocrats to everyday people and ordinary citizens.
– Cornel West
Kindness is in our power, even when fondness is not.
– Samuel Johnson
Kids now are so used to surround sound and the power in theater speakers, that the concert hall is a disappointment to them.
– David Ogden Stiers
Justice and power must be brought together, so that whatever is just may be powerful, and whatever is powerful may be just.
– Blaise Pascal
Just as Pollock used the drip to meld process and product, Richter 'found' and used the smudge and the blur to ravish the eye, creating works of psychic and physical power.
– Jerry Saltz
It's okay to be a fat man. It's prestige and power and all of that. But fat women are seen as just lazy and stupid and having no self-control.
– Camryn Manheim
It's okay for Christians throughout centuries to exterminate races and for their priests to rape little kids throughout decades, but trying to give the people the power to think and be individual, that's evil?
– Glenn Danzig
It's not possible for two countries to be the leading dominant political power at the same time.
– Fareed Zakaria
It's easy to dislike the few senior women out there. What if women were half the positions in power? It would be harder to dislike all of them.
– Sheryl Sandberg
It's being willing to walk away that gives you strength and power - if you're willing to accept the consequences of doing what you want to do.
– Whoopi Goldberg
It's a life's journey of finding ourselves, finding our power, and living for yourself, not for everyone else.
– Mariska Hargitay
It will make a weak man mighty. it will make a mighty man fall. It will fill your heart and hands or leave you with nothing at all. It's the eyes for the blind and legs for the lame. It is the love for hate and pride for shame. That's the power of the gospel.
– Ben Harper
It was R.E.M. who showed other Eighties bands how to get away with ignoring the rules - they lived in some weird town nobody never heard of, they didn't play power chords, they probably couldn't even spell 'spandex.' All they had was songs.
– Rob Sheffield
It takes tremendous discipline to control the influence, the power you have over other people's lives.
– Clint Eastwood
It seems to me the Washington Monument is a symbol of America's power. It has been the symbol of our great nation. We look at the symbol and we say 'this is one nation under God.'
– Pat Robertson
It is through this mysterious power that we too have our being, and we therefore yield to our neighbors, even to our animal neighbors, the same right as ourselves to inhabit this vast land.
– Sitting Bull
It is impossible for any number which is a power greater than the second to be written as a sum of two like powers. I have a truly marvelous demonstration of this proposition which this margin is too narrow to contain.
– Pierre de Fermat
It is always a disappointment to turn from forthright consideration of some subject - whether from the Left or the Right, a poet or a plumber - to the Beltway version, in which the only aspects of the issue that matter are the effects it will have on the fortunes of the two parties and the various men in power.
– Thomas Frank
Ironically, women who acquire power are more likely to be criticized for it than are the men who have always had it.
– Carolyn Heilbrun
Information can bring you choices and choices bring power - educate yourself about your options and choices. Never remain in the dark of ignorance.
– Joy Page
In the United States, though power corrupts, the expectation of power paralyzes.
– John Kenneth Galbraith
In the sense that you're not at the centre of power, like a president or prime minister of a major power, everyone is marginalised my position doesn't isn't unique in that respect. I think there are different sorts of relevance in different contexts.
– Peter Singer
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.
– Ken Blanchard
In the Old Testament, it says that if you have the power to do something good, then you have to do it. You're not to avoid helping somebody in their time of need.
– Rick Warren
In the next 10 years, I expect at least five billion people worldwide to own smartphones, giving every individual with such a phone instant access to the full power of the Internet, every moment of every day.
– Marc Andreessen
In the intellectual order, the virtue of humility is nothing more nor less than the power of attention.
– Simone Weil
In terms of individuals who actually inspired me, very few of the academic people that I had access to had that power over me. Maybe it's simply because I wasn't that committed to geometry.
– Twyla Tharp
In reality, Republicans have long been at war with clean energy. They have ridiculed investments in solar and wind power, bashed energy-efficiency standards, attacked state moves to promote renewable energy and championed laws that would enshrine taxpayer subsidies for fossil fuels while stripping them from wind and solar.
– Jeff Goodell
In our natural state, we are glorious beings. In the world of illusion, we are lost and imprisoned, slaves to our appetites and our will to false power.
– Marianne Williamson
In all our associations in all our agreements let us never lose sight of this fundamental maxim - that all power was originally lodged in, and consequently is derived from, the people.
– George Mason
In a world awash in debt, power shifts to creditors.
– Fareed Zakaria
If you think of paying court to the men in power, your eternal ruin is assured.
– Stendhal
If women be educated for dependence that is, to act according to the will of another fallible being, and submit, right or wrong, to power, where are we to stop?
– Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
If the Holy Spirit can take over the subconscious with our consent and cooperation, then we have almighty Power working at the basis of our lives, then we can do anything we ought to do, go anywhere we ought to go, and be anything we ought to be.
– E. Stanley Jones
If some people have the belief or view that the Dalai Lama has some miracle power, that's totally nonsense.
– The Dalai Lama
If one can stick to the training throughout the many long years, then will power is no longer a problem. It's raining? That doesn't matter. I am tired? That's besides the point. It's simply that I just have to.
– Emil Zatopek
If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.
– John Stuart Mill
I've become invested with this symbolic power. It really does transcend what I'm actually doing and what I actually deserve.
– Nate Silver
I'm sure we, the American people, are the butt of jokes by those in power.
– Alice Walker
I'm not the same person I was. I used to act dumb. It was an act. I am 26 years old, and that act is no longer cute. It is not who I am, nor do I want to be that person for the young girls who looked up to me. I know now that I can make a difference, that I have the power to do that.
– Paris Hilton
I'm not out burning bras, but I'm very opinionated about women owning their power.
– Katherine Heigl
I'm not in power, but my ideas are in power. And my ideas will prevail.
– Ehud Olmert
I'm not a power person. I like everyone to be on an equal footing.
– Jack Nicholson
I'm appalled the word feminism has been denigrated to a place of almost ridicule and I very passionately believe the word needs to be revalued and reintroduced with power and understanding that this is a global picture.
– Annie Lennox
I'd always felt very strongly in the power of vocation.
– Daniel Day Lewis
I would not send a poor girl into the world, ignorant of the snares that beset her path nor would I watch and guard her, till, deprived of self-respect and self-reliance, she lost the power or the will to watch and guard herself .
– Anne Bronte
I would like nuclear fusion to become a practical power source. It would provide an inexhaustible supply of energy, without pollution or global warming.
– Stephen Hawking
I was now resolved to do everything in my power to defeat the system.
– Oskar Schindler
I used to wish there was a useful term for those of us who thought American power should be used to remove psychopathic dictators.
– Christopher Hitchens
I try to deal with the complexities of power and social life, but as far as the visual presentation goes I purposely avoid a high degree of difficulty.
– Barbara Kruger
I truly believe that we have infinite levels of power that we don't even know are available to us.
– Michael J. Fox
I think that the power is the principle. The principle of moving forward, as though you have the confidence to move forward, eventually gives you confidence when you look back and see what you've done.
– Robert Downey, Jr.
I think that if your approach is one where you don't want to alienate anybody, you're going to have to soften the viewpoint or the information that you're offering to such an extent that it doesn't have the power to make any difference. You have to take that risk.
– Eddie Vedder
I think it's child abuse to have someone in the public eye too young. Society basically values wealth and fame and power at the cost of well-being. In the case of a child, it's at the cost of someone's natural development. It's already hard enough to develop.
– Alanis Morissette
I think I have told you, but if I have not, you must have understood, that a man who has a vision is not able to use the power of it until after he has performed the vision on earth for the people to see.
– Black Elk
I think every individual has his or her own power, and it's a matter of working, taking time and defining what that power is.
– Jill Scott
I think actors are getting so much more power these days, but I'm not. I stay very much away from the decisions, the way in which things are orchestrated, what's been changed. I just try to stay completely in the role as the actor and as the character.
– Nicole Kidman
I think a responsibility comes with notoriety, but I never think of it as power. It's more like something you hold, like grains of sand. If you keep your hand closed, you can have it and possess it, but if you open your fingers in any way, you can lose it just as quickly.
– Diana Ross
I serve a higher power, Jesus Christ. I make no apologies in saying that.
– Rick Warren
I say to the Taliban: surrender the terrorists or surrender power. It's your choice.
– Tony Blair
I say the law should be blind to race, gender and sexual orientation, just as it claims to be blind to wealth and power. There should be no specially protected groups of any kind, except for children, the severely disabled and the elderly, whose physical frailty demands society's care.
– Camille Paglia
I love being a wife and homemaker - because it's my choice. My husband doesn't expect me to do it. I don't mind doing things for him because he does so much for me we both feel that way so there is no power struggle.
– Salma Hayek
I lived by the candlelight for two years because I couldn't afford power. It was nice and romantic at the time, but if you can't afford power you're pretty broke. You endure it.
– Jeremy Renner
I like doing things where I can get dirty, work with my hands, and use power tools. Last weekend, I did some grouting.
– Nathan Fillion
I learned about the market's power when I was traded to the Buffalo Bills for $100.
– Jack Kemp
I learned a good deal about economics, and about America, from the author of the Reagan tax reforms - the great Jack Kemp. What gave Jack that incredible enthusiasm was his belief in the possibilities of free people, in the power of free enterprise and strong communities to overcome poverty and despair. We need that same optimism right now.
– Paul Ryan
I know the power obedience has of making things easy which seem impossible.
– Saint Teresa of Avila
I have two daughters and I have done everything in my power to prevent them from assimilating, even being aware of, my idiocy about my weight.
– Ayelet Waldman
I have never seen opponents so silent about their record, and so desperate to keep their power.
– Paul Ryan
I have heard that the Saudi Arabians are paying Greenpeace to campaign against Nuclear Power. It wouldn't surprise me at all.
– James Lovelock
I have hair that I audition with, my sitcom hair which is a curly wig. I have my long chic hair that I wear to my son's school so they know I'm not playing around. I always tell people that my husband gets a different woman every night when I come home from 'The View.' Hair makes you feel a certain way, like putting a power suit on.
– Sherri Shepherd
I foresee the Chinese ruling the world. What are you going to do to stop it? No president of the United States will ever have enough power to stop the Chinese when they want to take over the world.
– Evel Knievel
I don't think I've ever been an agnostic. I've always thought there's a superior power, that this is not the real world and that there's a world to come.
– Bob Dylan
I don't know what I would have done without believing in God. His support gives me power and energy to continue to be optimistic, to smile, not to be depressed. Sometimes, if things are not going so well, I don't cry. I say maybe it's meant to be.
– Ofra Haza
I don't have a set of tenets, but I live an ethical life. I practice a humility that presupposes there's a power greater than myself. And I always believe, don't inflict harm where it's not necessary.
– Michael J. Fox
I don't feel particularly comfortable about actors using whatever power they may have to push their beliefs, unless they're extremely well informed.
– Ralph Fiennes
I cured with the power that came through me.
– Black Elk
I consider 'Dr. Horrible' a tremendous success. The fact that it won an Emmy I just think lends validity to what we were doing and the point we were trying to make: taking the power into someone else's hands and changing the world.
– Nathan Fillion
I believe the root of all evil is abuse of power.
– Patricia Cornwell
I believe in the power of weakness.
– Pat Buckley