A Quote by Gilbert K. Chesterton

I came to the conclusion that the optimist thought everything good except the pessimist, and that the pessimist thought everything bad, except himself.

Gilbert K. Chesterton

Quote Topics

Bad Came Conclusion Everything Except Good Himself Optimist Pessimist Thought

Quote Author

Gilbert K. Chesterton
English - Writer
May 29, 1874 - June 14, 1936

But I am an optimist about Britain; and the difference between an optimist and a pessimist is not that the optimist believes the world is wonderful and the pessimist believes it's beset by challenges; the difference is the pessimist believes we will be defeated by them; the optimist thinks the challenges can be overcome.

Tony Blair

Don't ever become a pessimist... a pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun, and neither can stop the march of events.

Robert A. Heinlein

Between the optimist and the pessimist, the difference is droll. The optimist sees the doughnut; the pessimist the hole!

Oscar Wilde

The difference between an optimist and a pessimist? An optimist laughs to forget, but a pessimist forgets to laugh.

Tom Bodett

Do you know the difference between an optimist and a pessimist? A pessimist says ‘Oh dear, things can’t possibly get any worse.’ And an optimist says, ‘Don’t be so sad. Things can always get worse.

Steven Galloway

The optimist sees a light at the end of the tunnel, the realist sees a train entering the tunnel, the pessimist sees a train speeding at him, hell for leather, and the machinist sees three idiots sitting on the rail track. "The optimist proclaims that we live in the best of all possible worlds; the pessimist fears this is true."

James Branch Cabell

It might interest you to know that the 1828 Noah Webster Dictionary identifies the optimist in complimentary terms, but says nothing about the pessimist. The word 'pessimist' was not in our vocabulary at that time. It's a modern 'invention' which I believe we should 'dis-invent.'

Zig Ziglar

A pessimist is a man who thinks all women are bad. An optimist is one who hopes they are.

Chauncey Depew

I'm neither an optimist nor a pessimist. I am a dyed-in-the-woo l possibilist! By this, I mean with an eco-mind, we see that everything's connected and change is the only constant.

Frances Moore Lappé

That was one of the virtues of being a pessimist: nothing was ever as bad as you thought it would be.

James Jones

One can survive everything, nowadays, except death, and live down everything except a good reputation.

Oscar Wilde

Life inflicts the same setbacks and tragedies on the optimist as on the pessimist, but the optimist weathers them better.

Martin Seligman

When you wake up every day, you have two choices. You can either be positive or negative; an optimist or a pessimist. I choose to be an optimist. It's all a matter of perspective.

Harvey Mackay

Vision involves optimism and hope. The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity. The optimist sees opportunity in every difficulty. The pessimist tends to hold back people of vision from pushing ahead.

J. Oswald Sanders

I am not an optimist, because I am not sure that everything ends well. Nor am I a pessimist, because I am not sure that everything ends badly. I just carry hope in my heart.