Stewart Udall Quotes

Human beings may be miserable specimens, in the main, but we can learn, and, through learning, become decent people.

Every man has at times in his mind the Ideal of what he should be, but is not. This ideal may be high and complete, or it may be quite low and insufficient; yet in all men, that really seek to improve, it is better than the actual character... Man never falls so low, that he can see nothing higher than himself.

The hearts of men are their books; events are their tutors; great actions are their eloquence.

Tragedy is that our attention centers on what people are not, rather than on what they are and who they might become.

There is one further distinguishing characteristic of man which is very specific indeed and about which there can be no dispute, and that is the faculty of self-improvement - a faculty which, with the help of circumstance, progressively develops all our other faculties.

I'm always fascinated with how a person becomes a good quality person, a productive person, and how it happened to me, because I was a terror.

Every human being has the freedom to change at any instant.

Every man is a new method.

Do what you know and perception is converted into character.

The struggle for your own character is the struggle for the nation's character.

A person becomes great not be sitting on some high seat, but through higher qualities. Can a crow become an eagle by simply sitting on the top of a palatial building?

The great majority of those who speak of perfectibility as a dream, do so because they feel that it is one which would afford them no pleasure if it were realized.

Man can acquire accomplishments or he can become an animal, whichever he wants. God makes the animals, man makes himself.

As human beings we are made to surpass ourselves and are truly ourselves only when transcending ourselves.

Thus the radii of all education run together into one center which is called personality.

People are the common denominator of progress; no improvement is possible with unimproved people.

All good qualities must be sown and cultivated. We can’t expect to change overnight from an ordinary person into one with high realizations.

The sisters and brothers that you meet give you the materials which your character uses to build itself. It is said that some people are born great, others achieve it, some have it thrust upon them. In truth, the ways in which your character is built have to do with all three of those. Those around you, those you choose, and those who choose you.

Nobody can decide for himself whether he is going to be a human being. The only question open to him is whether he will be an ignorant undeveloped one or one who has sought to reach the highest point he is capable of attaining.

People don't change who they are. They only change what they do with it.

Each man is perfect by his nature; prophets have manifested this perfection, but it is potential in us.

No man can change himself into anything from sheer reason; he can only change into what he potentially is.

I was lucky to have the right heroes. Tell me who your heroes are and I'll tell you how you'll turn out to be. The qualities of the one you admire are the traits that you, with a little practice, can make your own, and that, if practiced, will become habit forming.

With a little more deliberation in the choice of their pursuits, all men would perhaps become essentially students and observers, for certainly their nature and destiny are interesting to all alike.

The antidote to this abuse of formal Government, is, the influence of private character, the growth of the Individual.