quotations about power
The almost insoluble task is to let neither the power of others, nor our own powerlessness, stupefy us.
THEODOR W. ADORNO
Minima Moralia
Truly powerful people have great humility. They do not try to impress, they do not try to be influential. They simply are. People are magnetically drawn to them. They are most often very silent and focused, aware of their core selves.... They never persuade, nor do they use manipulation or aggressiveness to get their way. They listen. If there is anything they can offer to assist you, they offer it; if not, they are silent.
SANAYA ROMAN
Living with Joy: Keys to Personal Power and Spiritual Transformation
Power deludes the ones who wield it.
BRIAN HERBERT & KEVIN J. ANDERSON
Dune: House Harkonnen
To claim power over what you do not understand is not wise, nor is the end of it likely to be good.
URSULA K. LE GUIN
The Farthest Shore
God made every man to have power to be mightier than the events round about him; to hold by his firm will the reigns by which all things are guided.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
Give me power but for a single day, and it is mine forever.
SEMIRAMIS
attributed, Day's Collacon
The steps of power are often steps on sand.
EDWARD COUNSEL
Maxims
Power never takes a back step -- only in the face of more power.
MALCOLM X
Malcolm X Speaks
Power gradually extirpates for the mind every humane and gentle virtue.
EDMUND BURKE
A Vindication of Natural Society
Power dies, power goes under and gutters out, ungraspable. It is momentary, quick of flight and liable to deceive. As soon as you rely on the possession it is gone. Forget that it ever existed, and it returns.
LOUISE ERDRICH
Tracks
Power based on love is a thousand times more effective and permanent than the one derived from fear of punishment.
MAHATMA GANDHI
The Indian States' Problem
So long as there is an uneasy class, a class which has not its just power, it will rashly clutch and blindly believe the notion that all men should have the same power.
WALTER BAGEHOT
The English Constitution
Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.
CARL SAGAN
The Demon-Haunted World
All persons possessing any portion of power ought to be strongly and awfully impressed with an idea that they act in trust and that they are to account for their conduct in that trust to the one great Master, Author, and Founder of society.
EDMUND BURKE
Reflections on the Revolution in France
Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud, is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people.
JOHN ADAMS
Novanglus Essays, No. 3
I hope our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us, that the less we use our power the greater it will be.
THOMAS JEFFERSON
letter to Mr. Leiper, June 12, 1815
Words frequently surrender power to the opposer.
EDWARD COUNSEL
Maxims
He who looks for great power searches for perils.
EDWARD COUNSEL
Maxims
Have you never thought how danger must surround power as shadow does light?
URSULA K. LE GUIN
A Wizard of Earthsea
Power broken into a thousand pieces can be hidden and disowned.
LEWIS H. LAPHAM
Waiting for the Barbarians