Quotes about Greatness
Great geniuses have the shortest biographies.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
The borrowing is often honest enough, and comes of magnanimity and stoutness. A great man quotes bravely and will not draw on his invention when his memory serves him with a word as good.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
Every great and commanding moment in the annals of the world is the triumph of some enthusiasm.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
He is great who confers the most benefits.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
The greatness of a man's power is the measure of his surrender.
— William Booth
Did you ever see a portrait of a great man without perceiving strong traits of pain and anxiety?
— John Adams
A contemplation of God's works, a generous concern for the good of mankind, and the unfeigned exercise of humility only, denominate men great and glorious.
— Joseph Addison
It does not take great men to do great things; it only takes consecrated men.
— Phillips Brooks
No really great man ever thought himself so.
— William Hazlitt
The Great Man is a man who lives a long way off.
— Elbert Hubbard
None save great men have been the authors of great heresies.
— St. Augustine