Pessimism of the spirit; optimism of the will.

I'm a pessimist because of intelligence, but an optimist because of will.

The challenge of modernity is to live without illusions and without becoming disillusioned.

I turn and turn in my cell like a fly that doesn't know where to die.

To tell the truth is revolutionary.

My practicality consists in this, in the knowledge that if you beat your head against the wall it is your head which breaks and not the wall - that is my strength, my only strength.

Pessimism of the spirit; optimism of the will.

Indifference is the dead weight of history.

Before puberty the child's personality has not yet formed and it is easier to guide its life and make it acquire specific habits of order, discipline, and work.

The only time I would like to see was the 20s and 30s in America because I love the music and the style and the optimism, I wanted to see New York being built. I wanted to see all that, you know.

If pessimism is despair, optimism is cowardice and stupidity. Is there any need to choose between them?

I am not a prophet in any sense of the word, and I entertain an active and intense dislike of the foregoing mixture of optimism, fatalism, and conservatism.

Optimism is inevitably the last hope of the defeated.

Optimism with some experience behind it is much more energizing than plain old experience with a certain degree of cynicism.

There are grounds for cautious optimism that we may now be near the end ofthe search for the ultimate laws of nature.

The average pencil is seven inches long, with just a half-inch eraser - in case you thought optimism was dead.

If you pretend to be good, the world takes you very seriously. If you pretend to be bad, it doesn't. Such is the astounding stupidity of optimism.

But Walt and him shared the same kind of optimism. Walt believed in himself, and he was optimistic about what he wanted to do. He just knew it will be okay, and Dali was the same way. They had a great deal in common that way.

With optimism, you look upon the sunny side of things. People say, 'Studs, you're an optimist.' I never said I was an optimist. I have hope because what's the alternative to hope? Despair? If you have despair, you might as well put your head in the oven.

Optimism is the foundation of courage.

Optimism - the doctrine or belief that everything is beautiful, including what is ugly.

My view is that at a younger age your optimism is more and you have more imagination etc. You have less bias.

Optimism is a kind of heart stimulant - the digitalis of failure.

Pessimism, when you get used to it, is just as agreeable as optimism.

These are the soul's changes. I don't believe in ageing. I believe in forever altering one's aspect to the sun. Hence my optimism.

The failure of national economic policy is costing us more than jobs; it has begun to weaken that uniquely American spirit of risk-taking, large ambition, and optimism about the future. We must rally them now to bold departures that rebuild our national morale as well as our material prosperity.

That is why, with optimism instead of fear, all those who want to see Puerto Rico's status resolved should seek the truth about each option, including the upside and the downside of each.

There is no fun in psychiatry. If you try to get fun out of it, you pay a considerable price for your unjustifiable optimism.

World War II, the atomic bomb, the Cold War, made it hard for Americans to continue their optimism.

Few things in the world are more powerful than a positive push. A smile. A world of optimism and hope. A "you can do it" when things are tough.

Comedy is acting out optimism.

What passes for optimism is most often the effect of an intellectual error.

The basis of optimism is sheer terror.

There's probably a little greater case for pessimism than optimism. But I do not rule out optimism.

We must return optimism to our parenting. To focus on the joys, not the hassles; the love, not the disappointments; the common sense, not the complexities.

Optimism is the opium of the people.

Optimism is essential to achievement and it is also the foundation of courage and true progress.

Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out.

Optimism doesn't wait on facts. It deals with prospects. Pessimism is a waste of time.

The essence of optimism is that it takes no account of the present, but it is a source of inspiration, of vitality and hope where others have resigned; it enables a man to hold his head high, to claim the future for himself and not to abandon it to his enemy.

I find nothing more depressing than optimism.

The young women in my classes are feisty and clever and believe, often with the passion of youthful optimism, that feminism is a battle already won. I worry for them - and for my daughters, too.

The biggest emotion in creation is the bridge to optimism.

I do believe that most men live lives of quiet desperation. For despair, optimism is the only practical solution. Hope is practical. Because eliminate that and it's pretty scary. Hope at least gives you the option of living.

My optimism wears heavy boots and is loud.

Emerson then incarnated the moral optimism, the progress, and the energy of the American spirit.

My optimism is not based primarily on the successful march of democracy in recent times but rather is based on the experience of having lived in a fear society and studied the mechanics of tyranny that sustain such a society.

Always the eternal optimist, President Reagan instilled confidence and optimism at a time both were in short supply in our country.

The optimism of a healthy mind is indefatigable.