Top 18 Quotes & Sayings by John Hay

Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American writer John Hay.

Last updated on April 20, 2025.

John Milton Hay was an American statesman and official whose career in government stretched over almost half a century. Beginning as a private secretary and assistant to Abraham Lincoln, Hay's highest office was United States Secretary of State under Presidents William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt. Hay was also an author and biographer, and wrote poetry and other literature throughout much of his life.

American - Writer | October 8, 1838 - July 1, 1905

Source: Wikipedia

The evils of tyranny are rarely seen but by him who resists it.

John Hay

Friends are the sunshine of life.

John Hay

Maidens! why should you worry in choosing whom you shall marry? Choose whom you may, you will find you have got somebody else.

John Hay

The best loved man or maid in the town would perish with anguish Could they hear all that their friends say in the course of a day.

John Hay

Break not the rose; its fragrance and beauty are surely sufficient, resting contented with these, never a thorn shall you feel.

John Hay

There are three species of creatures who when they seem coming are going, when they seem going they come: diplomats, women, and crabs.

John Hay

Speak with the speech of the world; think with the thoughts of the few.

John Hay

What is first love worth, except to prepare for a second? What does second love bring? Only regret for the first.

John Hay

It would never occur to most of us that 'plants' say anything at all, except in terms of what we read into them, or try to use them for. Yet in their responses to this wonderfully rhythmic and varying earth they are the most expressive of all forms of life.

John Hay

The people will come to their own at last,-God is not mocked forever.

John Hay

True luck consists not in holding the best of the cards at the table; luckiest is he who knows just when to rise and go home.

John Hay

Dealing with a government with whom mendacity is a science is an extremely difficult matter.

John Hay

At my door the Pale Horse stands to carry me to unknown lands.

John Hay

Make all good men your well-wishers, and then, in the years' steady sifting, Some of them turn into friends. Friends are the sunshine of life.

John Hay

Unto each man comes a day when his favorite sins all forsake him, And he complacently thinks he has forsaken his sins.

John Hay

There are occasions when you can hear the mysterious language of the Earth, in water, or coming through the trees, emanating from the mosses, seeping through the under currents of the soil, but you have to be willing to wait and receive.

John Hay