Trying quotes

Trying

18.3K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.

18.3K quotes

Explore further

Browse quotes that often appear alongside trying — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.

Quote collection

Trying quotes (page 120 of 917)

Follow a thought to its author, or read the full quote page.

C. S. Lewis Writer, Scholar
Trying

"We can never know that a piece of writing is bad unless we have begun by trying to read it as if it was very good and ended by discovering that we were paying the author an undeserved compliment."

Read quote 3 likes
C. S. Lewis Writer, Scholar
Trying

"You must not do, you must not even try to do, the will of the Father unless you are prepared to 'know of the doctrine'."

Read quote 3 likes
C. S. Lewis Writer, Scholar
Trying

"Lucy went first, biting her lip and trying not to say all the things she thought of saying to Susan. But she forgot them when she fixed her eyes on Aslan."

Read quote 3 likes
C. S. Lewis Writer, Scholar
Trying

"I haven't any language weak enough to depict the weakness of my spiritual life. If I weakened it enough it would cease to be language at all. As when you try to turn the gas-ring a little lower still, and it merely goes out."

Read quote 3 likes
Ban Ki-moon Diplomat
Trying

"I spend most of my time in South Korea but at least one-third of my time is spent traveling around the world, meeting people, speaking about climate change and sustainable development and trying to foster global citizenship especially for young people. What I observe is there clearly is a need for global citizenship. That is exactly right. We are having troubles around the world. We need global vision."

Read quote 3 likes
Barack Obama Politician
Trying

"I try never to get too high when things are going well. I try never to get too low when things are going poorly. I try to keep an even keel."

Read quote 3 likes
Barack Obama Politician
Trying

"When you start just focusing exclusively on trying to tear the other person down instead of what you are going to do on behalf of the American people to deal with this economy, then that's not serving Democrats, that's not serving Republicans, that's not serving anybody."

Read quote 3 likes
Barack Obama Politician
Trying

"We were still able to see the phone records of a potential terrorist cause, we held them, now you have to hope the phone company still has them, you have to argue with their chief counsel by the time you get access to it, and try to find out who they've been talking to before it's too late."

Read quote 3 likes
Barack Obama Politician
Trying

"If you look at how I've tried to and how I'll continue to try to govern, I'm not driven by some ideological agenda. I'm a pretty practical guy and I just want to make sure that things work."

Read quote 3 likes
Barack Obama Politician
Trying

"We have to have better intelligence. We have to have better interdiction capabilities. And so the issue is not how much we spend or how hard we try; the issue is are we doing it the right way? Are we being smart about it?"

Read quote 3 likes
Barack Obama Politician
Trying

"If you listen to the rhetoric, it is so over-the-top and so overheated, and most importantly, is not acknowledging the fact that there's nothing else [like guns] in our lives that we purchase where we don't try to make it a little safer if we can."

Read quote 3 likes
Barack Obama Politician
Trying

"When I was in Washington, I would usually get home from the Capitol at about 7:30 or 8, and I would try to write as much as possible. It was almost all in the wee hours."

Read quote 3 likes
Barack Obama Politician
Trying

"I remember having meetings with Republican senators who initially had been trying to engage [Obamacare] but saw that the politics of 'no' were growing inside the Republican Party."

Read quote 3 likes