Inspirational Quotes by George Will (American Columnist)

It is no longer enough to be lusty. One must be a sexual gourmet.
—George Will
Topics: Desires

Pessimism is as American as apple pie. Frozen apple pie with a slice of processed cheese.
—George Will
Topics: Pessimism

All politics takes place on a slippery slope. The most important four words in politics are “up to a point.”
—George Will
Topics: Politics

The nice part about being a pessimist is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised.
—George Will
Topics: Optimism, Pessimism

Modern man’s capacity for destruction is quixotic evidence of humanity’s capacity for reconstruction. The powerful technological agents we have unleashed against the environment include many of the agents we require for its reconstruction.
—George Will

If your job is to leaven ordinary lives with elevating spectacle, be elevating or be gone.
—George Will
Topics: Queens, Royalty, Kings

Voters don’t decide issues, they decide who will decide issues.
—George Will
Topics: Voting

Baseball, it is said, is only a game. True. And the Grand Canyon is only a hole in Arizona. Not all holes, or games, are created equal
—George Will
Topics: Baseball

Today more Americans are imprisoned for drug offenses than for property crimes
—George Will
Topics: Criminals, Crime

It is said that God gave us memory so we could have roses in winter. But it is also true that without memory we could not have self in any season. The more memories you have, the more you have. That is why, as Swift said, “No wise man ever wished to be younger.”
—George Will
Topics: Memory

Americans are overreaching; overreaching is the most admirable and most American of the many American excesses.
—George Will
Topics: Excess

Whatever right the Second Amendment protects is not as important as it was 200 years ago… The government should deconstitutionalize the subject by repealing the embarrassing Amendment.
—George Will

Sports serve society by providing vivid examples of excellence.
—George Will
Topics: Sports

Ronald Reagan has held the two most demeaning jobs in the country; President of the United States and radio broadcaster for the Chicago Cubs.
—George Will
Topics: Leaders, Leadership

Long before Einstein told us that matter is energy, Machiavelli and Hobbes and other modern political philosophers defined man as a lump of matter whose most politically relevant attribute is a form of energy called “self-interestedness.” This was not a portrait of man “warts and all.” It was all wart.
—George Will
Topics: Selfishness, Self-interest

Football combines the two worst features of American life. It is violence punctuated by committee meetings.
—George Will
Topics: Football, Just for Fun

Politics should share one purpose with religion: the steady emancipation of the individual through the education of his passions.
—George Will
Topics: Politicians, Politics

They are supposed to be dispassionate dispensers of Pure Justice, icy islands of emotionless calculation. In short, umpires should be acute Republicans
—George Will
Topics: Baseball

I say statecraft is soulcraft. Just as all education is moral education because learning conditions conduct, most legislation is moral legislations because it conditions the action and the thought of the nation in broad and important spheres in life.
—George Will
Topics: Ethics

The gap between ideals and actualities, between dreams and achievements, the gap that can spur strong men to increased exertions, but can break the spirit of others—this gap is the most conspicuous, continuous land mark in American history. It is conspicuous and continuous not because Americans achieve little, but because they dream grandly. The gap is a standing reproach to Americans; but it marks them off as a special and singularly admirable community among the world’s peoples.
—George Will
Topics: America

As advertising blather becomes the nation’s normal idiom, language becomes printed noise.
—George Will
Topics: Language, Advertising

A disquieting era of genetic manipulation is coming, one that may revolutionize human capacities, and notions of health. If we treat moral scruples impatiently, as inherently retrograde in a scientifically advancing civilization, we will not be in moral trim when, soon, our very humanity depends on our being in trim.
—George Will

Actually, there is only one “first question” of government, and it is “How should we live?” or “What kind of people do we want our citizens to be?”
—George Will
Topics: Ethics

The future has a way of arriving unannounced.
—George Will
Topics: Future, Carpe-diem

The four most important words in politics are ‘up to a point.’
—George Will

A politician’s words reveal less about what he thinks about his subject than what he thinks about his audience.
—George Will
Topics: Politics, Politicians, Audiences

We are given children to test us and make us more spiritual.
—George Will
Topics: Children

The pursuit of perfection often impedes improvement.
—George Will
Topics: Perfectionism, Perfection

She is so totally absorbed in a vocation—both a gift and a mastering passion—that she has no time to be absorbed with the self’s worries about itself. And that is the moral of the story: You can pursue happiness by wearing a torn jersey. You can catch it by being good at something you love.
—George Will
Topics: Passion

Childhood is frequently a solemn business for those inside it.
—George Will
Topics: Childhood

Wondering Whom to Read Next?

• William Safire American Columnist
• Maureen Dowd American Columnist
• Dorothy Dix American Journalist
• Marilyn vos Savant American Columnist
• Franklin P. Adams American Columnist
• John Mason Brown American Drama Critic
• George Matthew Adams American Columnist
• William F. Buckley, Jr. American TV Personality
• Glenn Beck American Mormon Children’s Books Writer
• Pauline Phillips (Abigail van Buren) American Columnist