John F. Kennedy Quotes

Our civilization has evolved through the continuous adjustment of society to the stimulus of new knowledge.

Christianity, democracy, science, education, wealth, and the cumulative inheritance of a thousand years, have not preserved us from the vain repetition of history.

The purpose of education is to make good human beings with skill and expertise... Enlightened human beings can be created by teachers.

Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe.

Education and democracy have the same goal: the fullest possible development of human capabilities.

The world has come around to the view that democracy is essential for full human development. And only education and skill development can make this possible.

Education is a slow-moving but powerful force. It may not be fast enough or strong enough to save us from catastrophe, but it is the strongest force available for that purpose and in its proper place, therefore, is not at the periphery, but at the center of international relations.

It is the object of learning, not only to satisfy the curiosity and perfect the spirits of ordinary men, but also to advance civilization.

Education is the single most important job of the human race.

History can show you that it was one pile of bad stuff after another. It can also show you that there's been tremendous progress in knowledge, behaviour, laws, civilisation. It cannot show you that there was a meaning behind it.

To make the moral achievement implicit in science a source of strength to civilization, the scientist will have to have the cooperation also of the philosopher and the religious teacher.

Things change in different countries as people grow, and as generations change.

I have been a teacher myself all my life. I have an intense passion to share with people. Our only salvation is in knowledge, in learning.

The function of the university is not simply to teach bread-winning, or to furnish teachers for the public schools or to be a centre of polite society; it is, above all, to be the organ of that fine adjustment between real life and the growing knowledge of life, an adjustment which forms the secret of civilization.

Where Schools are not vigorously and Honourable Encouraged, whole Colonies will sink apace; into a Degenerate and Contemptible Condition, and at last become horribly Barbarous

Upon the progress of knowledge the whole progress of the human race is immediately dependent: he who retards that, hinders this also.

The true test of civilization is, not the census, nor the size of cities, nor the crops,—no, but the kind of man the country turns out.

Fitness for self-government is not a God-given, natural right, but comes to a race only through the slow growth of centuries.

To me, education is not a commodity. It is a public good, essential to any society with a claim to being civilised.

Democracy, material wealth, and universal education are the soil upon which modernism exists.

Education is the only solution. Education first.

Teachers may think they are stuffing minds, but all they are ever affecting is the memory. Nothing can ever be forced into anyone's mind except by brainwashing, which is the very opposite of genuine teaching.

Educate and inform the whole mass of the people.

I really do believe that education, despite this massive potential in transforming human lives, has not received the kind of attention that people should have given to it.

Upon the subject of education, not presuming to dictate any plan or system respecting it, I can only say that I view it as the most important subject which we as a people can be engaged in. That every man may receive at least a moderate education...appears to be an object of vital importance...