A decent boldness ever meets with friends.
—Homer (751–651 BCE) Ancient Greek Poet
You will never do anything in this world without courage. It is the greatest quality of the mind next to honor.
—James Lane Allen (1849–1925) American Novelist, Short Story Writer
The weapon of the brave is in his heart.
—Common Proverb
There are a lot of fellas with all the ability it takes to play in the major leagues, but they never make it, they always get stuck in the minor leagues because they haven’t got the guts to make the climb.
—Cookie Lavagetto (1912–90) American Sportsperson
If you care about something, you have to protect it—if you’re lucky enough to find a way of life you love, you have to find the courage to live it.
—John Irving (b.1942) American Novelist, Short-story Writer
To know what is right and not do it is the worst cowardice.
—Confucius (551–479 BCE) Chinese Philosopher
The brave man is not he who feels no fear, for that were stupid and irrational; but he whose noble soul subdues its fear, and bravely dares the danger nature shrinks from.
—Joanna Baillie (1762–1851) Scottish Playwright, Poet
Courage consists not in hazarding without fear, but being resolutely minded in a just cause.
—Plutarch (c.46–c.120 CE) Greek Biographer, Philosopher
A true knight is fuller of bravery in the midst, than in the beginning of danger.
—Philip Sidney (1554–86) English Soldier Poet, Courtier
I would define true courage to be a perfect sensibility of the measure of danger, and a mental willingness to endure it.
—William Tecumseh Sherman (1820–91) American Military Leader, Businessperson, Educator
The most sublime courage I have ever witnessed has been among that class too poor to know they possessed it, and too humble for the world to discover it.
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish Playwright
The world’s male chivalry has perished out, but women are knights-errant to the last; and, if Cervantes had been greater still, he had made his Don a Donna.
—Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806–61) English Poet
Indecision is the thief of opportunity.
—Jim Rohn (1930–2009) American Entrepreneur, Author, Motivational Speaker
Facing it, always facing it, that’s the way to get through. Face it.
—Joseph Conrad (1857–1924) Polish-born British Novelist
We stumble and fall constantly even when we are most enlightened. But when we are in true spiritual darkness, we do not even know that we have fallen.
—Thomas Merton (1915–68) American Trappist Monk
The most mortifying infirmity in human nature … is, perhaps, cowardice.
—Charles Lamb (1775–1834) British Essayist, Poet
It is easy to fly into a passion – anybody can do that – but to be angry with the right person to the right extent and at the right time with the right object and in the right way – that is not easy, and it is not everyone who can do it.
—Aristotle (384BCE–322BCE) Ancient Greek Philosopher, Scholar
What is courage? This courage will not be the opposite of despair. We shall often be faced with despair, as indeed every sensitive person has been during the last several decades in this country. Hence Kierkegaard and Nietzsche and Camus and Sartre have proclaimed that courage is not the absence of despair; it is, rather, the capacity to move ahead in spite of despair.
—Rollo May (1909–94) American Philosopher
And what he greatly thought, he nobly dared.
—Homer (751–651 BCE) Ancient Greek Poet
If you think you can, you can.
And if you think you can’t, you’re right.
—Mary Kay Ash (1918–2001) American Entrepreneur, Businessperson
Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear — not absence of fear. Except a creature be part coward, it is not a compliment to say it is brave; it is merely a loose misapplication of the word. Consider the flea!-incomparably the bravest of all the creatures of God, if ignorance of fear were courage. Whether you are asleep or awake he will attack you, caring nothing for the fact that in bulk and strength you are to him as are the massed armies of the earth to a sucking child; he lives both day and night and all days and nights in the very lap of peril and the immediate presence of death, and yet is no more afraid than is the man who walks the streets of a city that was threatened by an earthquake ten centuries before. When we speak of Clive, Nelson, and Putnam as men who didn’t know what fear was,” we ought always to add the flea-and put him at the head of the procession.”
—Mark Twain (1835–1910) American Humorist
You have to accept whatever comes and the only important thing is that you meet it with courage and with the best that you have to give.
—Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) American First Lady, Diplomat, Humanitarian
Considering how dangerous everything is, nothing is really very frightening.
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946) American Writer
In all the woods and forests, God did not create a single leaf the same as any other… People go against nature because they lack the courage to be different.
—Paulo Coelho (b.1947) Brazilian Songwriter, Novelist
He shall fare well who confronts circumstances alight.
—Plutarch (c.46–c.120 CE) Greek Biographer, Philosopher
There is something healthy and invigorating about direct action.
—Henry Miller (1891–1980) American Novelist
Hatred and fear blind us. We no longer see each other. We see only the faces of monsters, and that gives us the courage to destroy each other.
—Thich Nhat Hanh (1926–2022) Vietnamese Buddhist Religious Leader, Teacher, Author, Peace Activist
If the human race is to continue for another million years, we will have to boldly go where no one has gone before.
—Stephen Hawking (1942–2018) English Theoretical Physicist, Cosmologist, Academic
If you want to see the brave, look at those who can forgive.
—The Bhagavad Gita Hindu Scripture
Courage is a learned mental skill that you must condition, just as weight training strengthens your muscles.
—Steve Pavlina (b.1971) American Motivational Speaker