John Dewey Quotes

No matter what I said they insisted on thinking of God as something outside themselves. Something that yearns to take every indolent moron to His breast and comfort him. The notion that the effort has to be their own . . . and that the trouble they are in is all their own doing . . . is one that they can't or won't entertain.

We cannot wait for great visions from great people, for they are in short supply. It is up to us to light our own small fires in the darkness.

I believe I am the highest power, absolutely.

A man, as a general rule, owes very little to what he is born with - a man is what he makes of himself.

It is not God's will merely that we should be happy, but that we should make ourselves happy.

Humanism is the creed of those who believe that in the circle of enwrapping mystery, men's fates are in their own hands—a faith that for modern man is becoming the only possible faith.

In our obscurity - in all this vastness - there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. It is up to us.

But remember this: in the final analysis, you can believe in your dream, you can be taught, supported, motivated, and loved by others, but ultimately, your success depends on you. You must take responsibility for your body, your mind, and for your character.

We may find it convenient to live with the illusion that circumstances or other people are responsible for the quality of our lives, but the reality is that we are responsible-response-able-for our choices.

Ah! If man would but see that hope is from within and not from without - that he himself must work out his own salvation.

We are the ones we've been waiting for.

Don't wait for a Gandhi, don't wait for a King, don't wait for a Mandela. You are your own Mandela, you are your own Gandhi, you are your own King.

You must personally accept the responsibility of improving your own life.

I don't think I have something that's pronounceable as a philosophy. ... When it was fashionable to say, "May the Force be with you," I always said, "Force yourself." ... I'll say again then, "The Force is within you. Force yourself."

I think that you're just as close to Jesus if you use the equipment he gave you other than to call on him to do for you what you can do for yourself.

If you want sense, you'll have to make it yourself.

We don't need to shift our responsibilities onto the shoulders of some deified Spiritual Superman, or sit around and wait for Fate to come knocking at the door. We simply need to believe in the power that's within us, and use it. When we do that, and stop imitating others and competing against them, things begin to work for us.

No diety will save us; we must save ourselves.

There is something infantile in the presumption that somebody else has a responsibility to give your life meaning and point… The truly adult view, by contrast, is that our life is as meaningful, as full and as wonderful as we choose to make it.

There's nothing new under the sun. All the roads lead to Rome. And people cannot provide it for you. I can't wake you up. You can wake you up. I can't cure you. You can cure you.

You cannot build character and courage by taking away people's initiative and independence. You cannot help people permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves.

I think about the things I control and do them well.

We are the makers of our own state and...individuals who realize the fact need not, ought not, to wait for collective action.

Man is the artificer of his own happiness.

Do you want your life to truly take off? Then change your idea about it. About you. Think, speak and act as the God You Are.