Through me you pass into the city of woe: Through me you pass into eternal pain: Through me among the people lost for aye. Justice the founder of my fabric moved: To rear me was the task of power divine, Supremest wisdom, and primeval love. Before me things create were none, save things Eternal, and eternal I shall endure. All hope abandon, ye who enter here. Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy

Talent finds its models, methods, and ends in society, exists for exhibition, and goes to the soul only for power to work. Genius is its own end, and draws its means and the style of its architecture from within. Ralph Waldo Emerson, The Method of Nature (1841)

Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men. Martin Luther King Jr., Strength to Love, 1963

If mankind minus one were of one opinion, then mankind is no more justified in silencing the one than the one - if he had the power - would be justified in silencing mankind. John Stuart Mill

What is good? All that heightens the feeling of power in man, the will to power, power itself. What is bad? All that is born of weakness. What is happiness? The feeling that power is growing, that resistance is overcome. Friedrich Nietzsche, The Antichrist, section 2

I see knowledge increasing and human power increasing. I see ever-increasing possibilities before life, And I see no limits set to it at all, Existence impresses me as a perpetual dawn. Our lives, as I apprehend, are great in expectations. H. G. Wells

The problem of power is how to achieve its responsible use rather than its irresponsible and indulgent use - of how to get men of power to live for the public rather than off the public. Robert F. Kennedy

I repeat...that all power is a trust that we are accountable for its exercise that from the people, and for the people all springs, and all must exist. Benjamin Disraeli

To deny we need and want power is to deny that we hope to be effective. Liz Smith

Elegance of language may not be in the power of all of us; but simplicity and straight forwardness are. Write much as you would speak; speak as you think. If with your inferior, speak no coarser than usual; if with your superiors, no finer. Be what you say; and, within the rules of prudence, say what you are. Alford

The power of the mind is an incredible thing, one that can never be underestimated. Mia Hamm

If a rhinoceros were to enter this resteraunt now, there is no denying he would have great power here. But I would be the first to rise and assure him that he had no authority whatever. G. K. Chesterton

Be fit for more than the thing you are now doing. Let everyone know that you have a reserve in yourself; that you have more power than you are now using. If you are not too large for the place you occupy, you are too small for it. James A. Garfield

There is only one way to happiness and that is to cease worrying about things which are beyond the power of our will. Epictetus

Physics does not change the nature of the world it studies, and no science of behavior can change the essential nature of man, even though both sciences yield technologies with a vast power to manipulate their subject matters. B. F. Skinner

Never stand begging for that which you have the power to earn. Miguel de Cervantes

Let him that hath no power of patience retire within himself, though even there he will have to put up with himself. Baltasar Gracian

No beast is more savage than man when possessed with power answerable to his rage. Plutarch

The secret of power is the knowledge that others are more cowardly than you are. Ludwig Boerne

The beauty of religious mania is that it has the power to explain everything. Once God or Satan is accepted as the first cause of everything which happens in the mortal world, nothing is left to chance... logic can be happily tossed out the window. Stephen King

( quotes are updated each month )