87 quotes about Ambition



Very few people are ambitious in the sense of having a specific image of what they want to achieve. Most people's sights are only toward the next run, the next increment of money.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Bardwick, Judith M. quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition -- it is the last infirmity of noble minds.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Barrie, Sir James M. quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

All ambitions are lawful except those that climb upward on the miseries or credulities of mankind.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Beecher, Henry Ward quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition. An overmastering desire to be vilified by enemies while living and made ridiculous by friends when dead.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Bierce, Ambrose quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Great ambition is the passion of a great character. Those endowed with it may perform very good or very bad acts. All depends on the principals which direct them.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Bonaparte, Napoleon quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

What I aspired to be and was not, comforts me.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Browning, Robert quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

'Tis not what man does which exalts him, but what man Would do!
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Browning, Robert quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition is not what man does... but what man would do.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Browning, Robert quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for?
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Browning, Robert quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

The slave has but one master, the ambitious man has as many as there are persons whose aid may contribute to the advancement of his fortunes.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Bruyere, Jean De La quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition can creep as well as soar.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Burke, Edmund quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Like dogs in a wheel, birds in a cage, or squirrels in a chain, ambitious men still climb and climb, with great labor, and incessant anxiety, but never reach the top.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Burton, Robert quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

He who surpasses or subdues mankind, must look down on the hate of those below.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Byron, Lord quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

As falls the dew on quenchless sands, blood only serves to wash ambition's hands.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Byron, Lord quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

The men who succeed are the efficient few. They are the few who have the ambition and will power to develop themselves.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Casson, Herbert N. quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Big results require big ambitions.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Champy, James quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

When you are aspiring to the highest place, it is honorable to reach the second or even the third rank.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Cicero, Marcus T. quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

The noblest spirit is most strongly attracted by the love of glory.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Cicero, Marcus T. quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition makes the same mistake concerning power that avarice makes concerning wealth. She begins by accumulating power as a means to happiness, and she finishes by continuing to accumulate it as an end.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Colton, Charles Caleb quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

A noble man compares and estimates himself by an idea which is higher than himself; and a mean man, by one lower than himself. The one produces aspiration; the other ambition, which is the way in which a vulgar man aspires.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Conrad, Joseph quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

I had ambition not only to go farther than any man had ever been before, but as far as it was possible for a man to go.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Cook, James R. quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

The passion of self-aggrandizement is persistent but plastic; it will never disappear from a vigorous mind, but may become morally higher by attaching itself to a larger conception of what constitutes the self.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Cooley, Charles Horton quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

I want to work with the top people, because only they have the courage and the confidence and the risk-seeking profile that you need.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Cutler, Laurel quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition is a Dead Sea fruit, and the greatest peril to the soul is that one is likely to get precisely what he is seeking.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Dahlberg, Edward quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

At the age of six I wanted to be a cook. At seven I wanted to be Napoleon. And my ambition has been growing steadily ever since.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Dali, Salvador quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Intelligence without ambition is a bird without wings.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Danielson, C. Archie quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition is like love, impatient both of delays and rivals.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Denham, Sir John quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

It seems to me we can never give up longing and wishing while we are thoroughly alive. There are certain things we feel to be beautiful and good, and we must hunger after them.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Eliot, George quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Without ambition one starts nothing. Without work one finishes nothing. The prize will not be sent to you. You have to win it. The man who knows how will always have a job. The man who also knows why will always be his boss. As to methods there may be a million and then some, but principles are few. The man who grasps principles can successfully select his own methods. The man who tries methods, ignoring principles, is sure to have trouble.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Emerson, Ralph Waldo quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition is the germ from which all growth of nobleness proceeds.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | English, Thomas Dunn quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition has its disappointments to sour us, but never the good fortune to satisfy us. Its appetite grows keener by indulgence and all we can gratify it with at present serves but the more to inflame its insatiable desires.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Franklin, Benjamin quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

The ambitious are forever followed by adulation for they receive the most pleasure from flattery.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Goldsmith, Oliver quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

I've got a great ambition to die of exhaustion rather than boredom.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Grossart, Angus quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Man is the only creature that strives to surpass himself, and yearns for the impossible.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Hoffer, Eric quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Nothing is too high for the daring of mortals: we storm heaven itself in our folly.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Horace quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

I shall strike the stars with my unlifted head.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Horace quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Where ambition can cover its enterprises, even to the person himself, under the appearance of principle, it is the most incurable and inflexible of passions.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Hume, David quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

He that fails in his endeavors after wealth or power will not long retain either honesty or courage.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Johnson, Samuel quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

To be happy at home is the ultimate result of all ambition, the end to which every enterprise and labor tends, and of which every desire prompts the prosecution.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Johnson, Samuel quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

We grow small trying to be great.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Jones, Eli Stanley quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition is pitiless. Any merit that it cannot use it finds despicable.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Joubert, Joseph quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

When you go in search of honey you must expect to be stung by bees.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Kaunda, Kenneth quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition never comes to an end.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Kenko, Yoshida quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

A slave has but one master. An ambition man, has as many as there are people who helped him get his fortune.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | La Bruyere, Jean De quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

He who tip-toes cannot stand; he who strides cannot walk.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Lao-Tzu quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition has one heel nailed in well, though she stretch her fingers to touch the heavens.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Lilly, William quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Lincoln, Abraham quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Most people would succeed in small things if they were not troubled with great ambitions.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Greatly begin. Though thou have time, but for a line, be that sublime . Not failure, but low aim is crime.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Lowell, James Russell quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Our ambition should be to rule ourselves, the true kingdom for each one of us; and true progress is to know more, and be more, and to do more.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Lubbock, Sir John quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition is so powerful a passion in the human breast, that however high we reach we are never satisfied.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Machiavelli, Niccolo quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Nature that framed us of four elements, warring within our breasts for regiment, doth teach us all to have aspiring minds.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Marlowe, Christopher quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

If you have a great ambition, take as big a step as possible in the direction of fulfilling it. The step may only be a tiny one, but trust that it may be the largest one possible for now.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Mcafee, Mildred quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition is a poor excuse for not having sense enough to be lazy.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | McCarthy, Charlie quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

If men cease to believe that they will one day become gods then they will surely become worms.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Miller, Henry quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition is not a vice of little people.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Montaigne, Michel Eyquem De quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

A life spent in constant labor is a life wasted, save a man be such a fool as to regard a fulsome obituary notice as ample reward.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Nathan, George Jean quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition is a lust that is never quenched, but grows more inflamed and madder by enjoyment.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Otway, Thomas quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

The tallest trees are most in the power of the winds, and ambitious men of the blasts of fortune.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Penn, William quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Men would be angels, angels would be gods.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Pope, Alexander quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

When ambition ends, happiness begins.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Proverb, Hungarian quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Hasty climbers have sudden falls.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Proverb, Italian quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Though ambition in itself is a vice, it often is also the parent of virtue.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Quinet, Edgar quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

I had no ambition to make a fortune. Mere money-making has never been my goal, I had an ambition to build.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Rockefeller, John D. quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

The person who starts out simply with the idea of getting rich won't succeed; you must have a larger ambition. There is no mystery in business success. If you do each day's task successfully, and stay faithfully within these natural operations of commercial laws which I talk so much about, and keep your head clear, you will come out all right.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Rockefeller, John D. quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Don't be afraid to give up the good to go for the great.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Rogers, Kenny quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

It is the nature of ambition to make men liars and cheats, to hide the truth in their breasts, and show, like jugglers, another thing in their mouths, to cut all friendships and enmities to the measure of their own interest, and to make a good countenance without the help of good will.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Sallust quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition breaks the ties of blood, and forgets the obligations of gratitude.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Scott, Sir Walter quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

It is the constant fault and inseparable evil quality of ambition, that it never looks behind it.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Seneca quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

The very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Shakespeare, William quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

As he was valiant, I honor him. But as he was ambitious, I slew him.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Shakespeare, William quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition should be made of sterner stuff.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Shakespeare, William quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

To be ambitious of true honor, of the true glory and perfection of our natures, is the very principle and incentive of virtue.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Sidney, Sir Philip quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Every child has great ambitions. As he grows, he is bombarded by negative suggestions -- you can't do this; you can't do that; be careful; look for security, and so on. Year by year, he experiences the realities of life, and his ambitions fade away. Figuratively speaking, most children die by the time they reach their adulthood.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Sinha, Shall quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition if it feeds at all, does so on the ambition of others.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Sontag, Susan quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition is an idol, on whose wings great minds are carried only to extreme; to be sublimely great or to be nothing.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Southey, Robert quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

There are glimpses of heaven to us in every act, or thought, or word, that raises us above ourselves.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Stanley, Arthur P. quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Ambition often puts Men upon doing the meanest offices; so climbing is performed in the same position with creeping.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Swift, Jonathan quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

If you wish to reach the highest, begin at the lowest.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Syrus, Publilius quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Where there are large powers with little ambition... nature may be said to have fallen short of her purposes.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Taylor, Sir Henry quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

So many worlds, so much to do, so little done, such things to be.
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Tennyson, Lord Alfred quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UKBooks from this quote author on Amazon UK

Keep your feet on the ground, but let your heart soar as high as it will. Refuse to be average or to surrender to the chill of your spiritual environment. [The Root Of The Righteous]
Email this quotation to a friend     View quote | Tozer, A. W. quotes
      Related items on Amazon USABooks from this quotation author on Amazon US or UK