A Quote by Theodore Roosevelt

The world wants the kind of men who do not shrink from temporary defeats in life; but come again and wrestle triumph from defeat. — © Theodore Roosevelt
The world wants the kind of men who do not shrink from temporary defeats in life; but come again and wrestle triumph from defeat.
We see men who have accumulated great fortunes, but we often recognize only their triumph, overlooking the temporary defeats which they had to surmount before arriving.
Before success comes in any man's life, he's sure to meet with much temporary defeat and, perhaps some failures. When defeat overtakes a man, the easiest and the most logical thing to do is to quit. That's exactly what the majority of men do.
Why do otherwise sane, competent, strong men, men who can wrestle bears or raid corporations, shrink away in horror at the thought of washing a dish or changing a diaper?
Young people . . , God wants us to be victorious. He wants you to triumph over all of your foes. Stalwart and brave we must stand. God is at the helm. There is no reason for defeat.
Life is atrocious, we know. But precisely because I expect little of the human condition, man's periods of felicity, his partial progress, his efforts to begin over again and continue, all seem to me like so many prodigies which nearly compensate for the monstrous mass of ills and defeats, of indifference and error. Catastrophe and ruin will come; disorder will triumph, but order will too, from time to time.
Fear is the tool of a man-made devil. Self-confident faith in one's self is both the man-made weapon which defeats this devil and the man-made tool which builds a triumphant life. And it is more than that. It is a link to the irresistible forces of the universe which stand behind a man who does not believe in failure and defeat as being anything but temporary experiences.
Even if a king defeats his enemy in battle, that still doesn't settle anything. There are other, less numerous armies of philosophers and scientists, and their contests determine the true triumph or defeat of nations. One scholar is matched with another; one creative mind with another; and one judicious temperament with his counterpart. A victory won on that field counts for three won by force of arms.
You can't win every battle! You must have the word Defeat in your dictionary; if not, defeat will triumph even more strongly!
In every adversity there lies the seed of an equivalent advantage. In every defeat is a lesson showing you how to win the victory next time. [But you must know enough to realise this, lest you focus more on the defeat than finding the lesson you paid for with the defeat. With every defeat and mistake, you have the logical right to get excited about the future when you will understand and be able to apply the lessons and thereby turn defeat and temporary failure into victory and permanent success.]
It's about bums on seats. If nobody wants to listen to what you are doing, it kind of defeats the purpose really, doesn't it?
What is life without its angles of difficulty and defeat, and its tip of triumph and power?
After heart surgery you can go two ways, you can kind of get scared, shrink on to your sofa and keep yourself safe, or you can engage with life again. I probably was in danger of taking the first option.
We fight for lost causes because we know that our defeat and dismay may be the preface to our successors' victory, though that victory itself will be temporary; we fight rather to keep something alive than in the expectation that anything will triumph.
A wise man may be duped as well as a fool; but the fool publishes the triumph of his deceiver; the wise man is silent, and denies that triumph to an enemy which he would hardly concede to a friend; a triumph that proclaims his own defeat.
Women deluded by these sentiments, sometimes boast of their weakness, cunningly obtaining power by playing on the weakness of men; and they may well glory in their illicit sway, for, like Turkish bashaws, they have more real power than their masters: but virtue is sacrificed to temporary gratifications, and the respectability of life to the triumph of an hour.
It is defeat that turns bone to flint; it is defeat that turns gristle to muscle; it is defeat that makes men invincible. Do not then be afraid of defeat. You are never so near to victory as when defeated in a good cause.
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