35th President of the
United States, from 1961 until his assassination in 1963
"Forgive your enemies, but never forget their names."
"Do not pray for easy lives. Pray to be stronger men."
"Conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth."
"Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind."
"Efforts and courage are not enough without purpose and direction."
"Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate."
"Freedom is indivisible, and when one man is enslaved, all are not free."
"It is an unfortunate fact that we can secure peace only by preparing for war."
"Some men dream things that are and ask why. I dream things that aren't and ask why not."
"We shall pay any price, bear any burden, to assure the survival and the success of liberty."
"No government or social system is so evil that its people must
be considered as lacking in virtue."
"As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them."
"A nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people."
"A young man who does not have what it takes to perform military service is not likely to have what it takes to make a living."
"All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin. And therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words "Ich bin ein Berliner!"
"When written in Chinese, the word 'crisis' is composed of two characters--one represents danger, and the other represents opportunity."
"For time and the world do not stand still. Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or the present are certain to miss the future."
"I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the Earth."
"Today the expenditure of billions of dollars every year on weapons acquired for the purpose of making sure we never need them is essential to the keeping of peace."
"Neither the United States of America nor the world community of nations can tolerate deliberate deception and offensive threats on the part of any nation, large or small."
"Let us not seek the Republican answer or the Democratic answer, but the right answer. Let us not seek to fix the blame for the past. Let us accept our own responsibility for the future."
"Our goal is not the victory of might, but the vindication of right; not peace at the expense of freedom, but both peace and freedom, here in this hemisphere, and, we hope, around the world."
"Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, to assure the survival and the success of liberty."
"A nation which has forgotten the quality of courage which in the past has been brought to public life is not as likely to insist upon or regard that quality in its chosen leaders today - and in fact we have forgotten."
"Nuclear weapons are so destructive and ballistic missiles are so swift, that any substantially increased possibility of their use or any sudden change in their deployment may well be regarded as a definite threat to peace."
"With a good conscience our only sure reward, with history the final judge of our deeds, let us go forth to lead the land we love, asking His blessing and His help, but knowing that here on earth God's work must truly be our own."
"For man holds in his mortal hands the power to abolish all forms of human poverty and all forms of human life. And yet the same revolutionary beliefs for which our forebears fought are still at issue around the globe -- the belief that the rights of man come not from the generosity of the state, but from the hand of God."
"We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too."
"Freedom is indivisible, and when one man is enslaved, all are not free. When all are free, then we can look forward to that day when this city will be joined as one and this country and this great Continent of Europe in a peaceful and hopeful globe. When that day finally comes, as it will, the people of West Berlin can take sober satisfaction in the fact that they were in the front lines for almost two decades."
"In short, we must face problems which do not lend themselves to easy or quick or permanent solutions. And we must face the fact that the United States is neither omnipotent nor omniscient, that we are only six percent of the world's population, that we cannot impose our will upon the other ninety-four percent of mankind, that we cannot right every wrong or reverse each adversity, and that therefore there cannot be an American solution to every world problem."
Compiled by Thomas George