David Souter Quotes

Time is running out on our opportunity to seize our opportunities and solve our problems.

You cannot afford to wait for perfect conditions. Goal setting is often a matter of balancing timing against available resources. Opportunities are easily lost while waiting for perfect conditions.

Our major obligation is not to mistake slogans for solutions.

There's nothing like a jolly good disaster to get people to start doing something.

It never occurred to any of us to consult in this emergency farmers, doctors, lawyers, shoemakers, or even statesmen. We could not escape the belief that the prospect of obtaining what we needed might be somewhat improved by making application to those whose business and surroundings qualified them to intelligently respond.

Do not change horses in mid stream unless horse lies to you and the stream is on fire.

When your house is on fire—that is not the time to talk

The Nation trembled on the brink. Events moved with such speed that it was necessary to decide to act on the instant, as each successive crisis arose.

Collaborative decision-making is very poor in crises.

When the house is on fire, don't tell me what your spiritual gift is. Just grab a hose and put out the fire.

The right decision is the wrong decision if it's made too late.

Why cannot one always do, not only the right thing, but at the right time?

When you have a time of crisis what happens depends on what ideas are floating around, and what ideas have been developed, and thought through, and are made effective.

There’s only two times in life, there’s now and there’s too late.

Where there is no uncertainty, there is no longer the need for leadership. The greater the uncertainty, the greater the need for leadership. Your capacity as a leader will be determined by how well you learn to deal with uncertainty.

I have the experience we need to make the changes we want and I think that's a winning case.

I'd rather be sorry for something I had done than for something I didn't do.

It's obvious we can't ignore the problem any longer. Locally and nationally, we cannot wait to see how bad it gets. We need to act now.

It is no matter what you teach them first, any more than what leg you shall put into your breeches first. You may stand disputing which is best to put in first, but in the mean time your breech is bare. Sir, while you are considering which of two things you should teach your child first, another boy has learned them both.

My friend Terry says that when you need to make a decision, in your work or otherwise, and you don’t know what to do, just do one thing or the other, because the worst that can happen is that you will have made a terrible mistake.

If we wait for the perfect answer, the world will pass us by

Might you be missing opportunities because you have been too quick to ask how instead of why?

But here's the ugly truth: nature doesn't care about democracy, or who's right, or what's fair. And because of the slow-change aspect of climate, we can't wait until the worst effects are upon us to make a decision -- by then, it would be far, far too late. The scenario we may be faced with is one where doing something for the wrong reasons, run by the wrong people, may still save more lives than holding out for a more appealing option.

If we wait until we've satisfied all the uncertainties, it may be too late.

Change almost never fails because it's too early. It almost always fails because it's too late.