quotations about courage
Courage is fear that has said its prayers.
KARLE WILSON BAKER
Dreamers on Horseback
Many people wrongly exclude fear from the definition of courage, believing that courage is the absence of fear. Every time such people feel afraid, they assume that they aren't courageous. The reality, though, is that courage is fearful. When we are acting courageously, we are, most typically, very afraid. But we don't allow the fear we're carrying to stop us. Instead, we press on. This is the signature feature of courage: to carry on despite being fearful. Fear, thus, is an essential element in the definition of courage. You can't be courageous unless you are afraid.
BILL TREASURER
Courage Goes to Work
Courage is in the air in bracing whiffs
Better than all the stalemate an's and ifs.
ROBERT FROST
"For John F. Kennedy His Inauguration"
I can sense it
Something important
Is about to happen
It's coming up
It takes courage to enjoy it
The hardcore and the gentle
BJÖRK
"Big Time Sensuality"
Everyone became brave from excess of terror.
GUSTAVE FLAUBERT
Salammbo
Courage in danger is half the battle.
PLAUTUS
Pseudolus
It requires more courage to suffer than to die.
NAPOLEON BONAPARTE
'Tis not too late to-morrow to be brave.
JOHN ARMSTRONG
The Art of Preserving Health
Courage does not always roar. Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, "I will try again tomorrow."
DEBORAH COLLINS
This Is Not the Life I Ordered
The courage with which we have met past dangers is often our best security in the present.
MADAME SWETCHINE
"Airelles,", The Writings of Madame Swetchine
Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.
WINSTON CHURCHILL
Winston Churchill's Great Quotation Book: From Alamein to Zest for Life
Without courage we cannot practice any other virtue with consistency. We can't be kind, true, merciful, generous, or honest.
MAYA ANGELOU
USA Today, Mar. 5, 1988
I hope you live a life you're proud of. If you find that you're not, I hope you have the courage to start all over again.
ERIC ROTH
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Courage is the thing. All goes if courage goes.
J.M. BARRIE
speech, May 3, 1922
I dare do all that may become a man;
Who dares do more is none.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Macbeth
The skin of the coward changes color all the time,
he can't get a grip on himself, he can't sit still,
he squats and rocks, shifting his weight from foot to foot,
his heart racing, pounding inside the fellow's ribs,
his teeth chattering -- he dreads some grisly death.
But the skin of the brave soldier never blanches.
HOMER
The Iliad
Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of a readiness to die.
G. K. CHESTERTON
Orthodoxy
Courage is being scared to death -- and saddling up anyway.
JOHN WAYNE
Reader's Digest, 1986
'Tis said that courage is common, but the immense esteem in which it is held proves it to be rare. Animal resistance, the instinct of the male animal when cornered, is no doubt common; but the pure article, courage with eyes, courage with conduct, self-possession at the cannon's mouth, cheerfulness in lonely adherence to the right, is the endowment of elevated characters.
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
Society and Solitude
This is the art of courage: to see things as they are and still believe that the victory lies not with those who avoid the bad, but those who taste, in living awareness, every drop of the good.
VICTORIA LINCOLN
Vogue, Oct. 1, 1952