Quotes and Sayings about Promises
"Promises are the uniquely human way of ordering the future, making it predictable and reliable to the extent that this is humanly possible."
- Hannah Arendt
(Related: Future, Promises)
"I thought Winston Churchill was a young man of promise, but it appears he is a young man of promises."
- Arthur Balfour
(Related: Thought, Man, Promise, Promises)
"Vote for the man who promises least; he'll be the least disappointing."
- Bernard Baruch
(Related: Man, Promises, Vote)
"I cannot belong to a nonprofit organization because when you receive grants, you have to make such great compromises with your artistic plans."
- Mikhail Baryshnikov
"Every Indian outbreak that I have ever known has resulted from broken promises and broken treaties by the government."
- Buffalo Bill
(Related: Government, Promises)
"We have to find compromises. That's the way it is in Norway."
- Kjell Magne Bondevik
"Let God's promises shine on your problems."
- Corrie Ten Boom
(Related: God, Problems, Promises)
"The notion that Congress can change the meaning given a constitutional provision by the Court is subversive of the function of judicial review; and it is not the less so because the Court promises to allow it only when the Constitution is moved to the left."
- Robert Bork
(Related: Change, Congress, Constitution, Court, Meaning, Promises)
"Our government has made a number of promises to the men and women who served in our nation's armed forces. Sadly, these promises of health care, education and other benefits have existed more in rhetoric than in reality."
- Allen Boyd
(Related: Education, Government, Health, Men, Women, Benefits, Care, Nation, Promises, Reality, Rhetoric)
"When he says he loves me, it only means he loves me at that particular instant. Like his promises, which he never keeps. Why does he torment me like this, when he could finish it off at once?"
- Eva Braun
(Related: Promises)
"What's important is promising something to the people, not actually keeping those promises. The people have always lived on hope alone."
- Hermann Broch
(Related: People, Hope, Promises)
"There is no single development, in either technology or management technique, which by itself promises even one order-of-magnitude improvement within a decade in productivity, in reliability, in simplicity."
- Frederick P. Brooks, Jr.
(Related: Technology, Development, Management, Improvement, Order, Productivity, Promises, Simplicity)
"Year after year, President Bush has broken his campaign promises on college aid. And year after year, the Republican leadership in Congress has let him do it."
- Sherrod Brown
(Related: Leadership, College, Congress, President, Promises, Republican)
"Bipartisanship helps to avoid extremes and imbalances. It causes compromises and accommodations. So let's cooperate."
- Zbigniew Brzezinski
(Related: Causes, Extremes)
"Unfortunately, in today's world we have to be reminded that the power of an oath derives from the fact that in it we ask God to bear witness to the promises we make with the implicit expectation that He will hold us accountable for the manner in which we honor them."
- James L. Buckley
(Related: Power, God, Expectation, Fact, Honor, Promises, Today, Will, World)
"America is like an unfaithful love who promises us more than we got."
- Charlotte Bunch
(Related: Love, America, Promises)
"Hypocrisy can afford to be magnificent in its promises, for never intending to go beyond promise, it costs nothing."
- Edmund Burke
(Related: Hypocrisy, Nothing, Promise, Promises)
"For anything worth having one must pay the price; and the price is always work, patience, love, self-sacrifice - no paper currency, no promises to pay, but the gold of real service."
- John Burroughs
(Related: Love, Work, Gold, Patience, Promises, Self, Service, Worth)
"Others may make you promises, once again, and then election after election not deliver. We will not do this."
- Mangosuthu Buthelezi
(Related: May, Promises, Will)
"You cannot live on other people's promises, but if you promise others enough, you can live on your own."
- Mark Caine
(Related: People, Promise, Promises)
"The future is as bright as the promises of God."
- William Carey
(Related: God, Future, Promises)
"What are facts but compromises? A fact merely marks the point where we have agreed to let investigation cease."
- Bliss Carman
(Related: Fact, Facts, Investigation)
"I often wish... that I could rid the world of the tyranny of facts. What are facts but compromises? A fact merely marks the point where we have agreed to let investigation cease."
- Bliss Carman
(Related: Fact, Facts, Investigation, Tyranny, World)
"How is it that, once victory took form and the horrible spectacle of the extermination camps was revealed, we could have shamelessly broken the promises given to the peoples in those years of ordeal?"
- Rene Cassin
(Related: Victory, Promises, Years)
"There are certain promises you make that are more sacred than anything that happens in a court of law, I don't care how many Bibles you put your hand on."
- Paul Castellano
(Related: Care, Court, Law, Promises)
"Good writers are often excellent at a hundred other things, but writing promises a greater latitude for the ego."
- John Cheever
(Related: Ego, Promises, Writers, Writing)
"If we do not act now to strengthen Social Security, the system that so many depend upon today will be unable to meet its promises to tomorrow's retirees, and it will burden our children and grandchildren with exhaustive taxes."
- Chris Chocola
(Related: Act, Burden, Children, Now, Promises, Security, Taxes, Today, Tomorrow, Will)
"The Bible is proved to be a revelation from God, by the reasonableness and holiness of its precepts; all its commands, exhortations, and promises having the most direct tendency to make men wise, holy, and happy in themselves, and useful to one another."
- Adam Clarke
(Related: Men, God, Bible, Holiness, Promises)
"They made us many promises, more than I can remember, but they never kept but one; they promised to take our land, and they took it."
- Red Cloud
(Related: Land, Promises)
"Social Security and Medicare represent promises made and we must keep these commitments."
- Tom Coburn
(Related: Promises, Security)
"I believe keeping our promises should be our highest priority and that means saving Social Security and Medicare while preserving the American dream for our children and grandchildren."
- Tom Coburn
(Related: Dream, American, Children, Promises, Security)
"Magic trick: to make people disappear, ask them to fulfill their promises."
- Mason Cooley
(Related: People, Magic, Promises)
"Money and corruption are ruining the land, crooked politicians betray the working man, pocketing the profits and treating us like sheep, and we're tired of hearing promises that we know they'll never keep."
- Ray Davies
(Related: Money, Corruption, Hearing, Land, Man, Politicians, Promises, Sheep)
"I also want to draw attention to the responsibilities that people have to live up to their election promises and to live up to the votes that were cast by the people of Wales, in the General Election, in the expectation that we would deliver this promise."
- Ron Davies
(Related: People, Attention, Expectation, Promise, Promises, Want)
"Real Democrats don't make promises they can't keep."
- Howard Dean
(Related: Democrats, Promises)
"Too many women throw themselves into romance because they're afraid of being single, then start making compromises and losing their identity. I won't do that."
- Julie Delpy
(Related: Women, Romance, Being, Identity, Losing)
"Man is not logical and his intellectual history is a record of mental reserves and compromises. He hangs on to what he can in his old beliefs even when he is compelled to surrender their logical basis."
- John Dewey
(Related: History, Beliefs, Man, Old, Surrender)
"Internet mailing lists are like Fox television shows. They have really cool previews, and they get you all excited about them, but they just don't live up to their promises."
- John Dobbin
(Related: Internet, Promises, Television)
"Yes, disappointment over perceived unfairness, injustice, promises not kept, tends to go hand in hand with increasing prosperity. Expectations are dashed. What can I say!"
- Mary Douglas
(Related: Disappointment, Expectations, Injustice, Promises, Prosperity)
"Unless commitment is made, there are only promises and hopes... but no plans."
- Peter Drucker
(Related: Commitment, Promises)
"I am confident that this legislature will rise above partisan bickering, especially after the public promises its members made last fall, and that it will demonstrate a high capacity for civil service."
- Charles Edison
(Related: Promises, Public, Service, Will)
"It is my happy privilege to be able to stand here and tell you that if you elect me you will have elected a governor who has made no promises of preferment to any man or group."
- Charles Edison
(Related: Man, Privilege, Promises, Will)
"In view of our public pledges, we public officials can never again go before the public merely promising election reform. The time for promises is past."
- Charles Edison
(Related: Time, Past, Promises, Public, Reform)
"If virtue promises happiness, prosperity and peace, then progress in virtue is progress in each of these for to whatever point the perfection of anything brings us, progress is always an approach toward it."
- Epictetus
(Related: Happiness, Peace, Progress, Virtue, Perfection, Promises, Prosperity)
"Solutions must be based on compromises."
- Joschka Fischer
"Life doesn't offer you promises whatsoever so it's very easy to become, 'Whatever happened to... ?' It's great to be wanted. I spent a few years not being wanted and this is better."
- Morgan Freeman
(Related: Life, Being, Promises, Years)
"The woods are lovely, dark and deep. But I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep."
- Robert Frost
(Related: Deep, Promises, Sleep)
"But I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep, and miles to go before I sleep."
- Robert Frost
(Related: Promises, Sleep)
"Thou ought to be nice, even to superstition, in keeping thy promises, and therefore equally cautious in making them."
- Thomas Fuller
(Related: Promises, Superstition)
"What generally happens in this county is that our politicians don't serve us well because they don't tell the truth, and they don't keep their promises."
- Peter Garrett
(Related: Truth, Politicians, Promises)
"Thousand got away to other countries; thousands returned to Spain tempted by false promises of kindness. By the tens of thousands, these Spaniards died of neglect in the concentration camps."
- Martha Gellhorn
(Related: Countries, Kindness, Neglect, Promises, Spain)
"In business, words are words; explanations are explanations, promises are promises, but only performance is reality."
- Harold S. Geneen
(Related: Business, Performance, Explanations, Promises, Reality, Words)
"It is an immutable law in business that words are words, explanations are explanations, promises are promises-but only performance is reality."
- Harold S. Geneen
(Related: Business, Performance, Explanations, Law, Promises, Reality, Words)
"I think it is an immutable law in business that words are words, explanations are explanations, promises are promises - but only performance is reality."
- Harold S. Geneen
(Related: Business, Performance, Explanations, Law, Promises, Reality, Words)
"Proof that they do not understand the republic is that in their fine promises for universal suffrage, they forgot women."
- Delphine de Girardin
(Related: Women, Promises, Proof)
"Art is uncompromising and life is full of compromises."
- Gunther Grass
(Related: Art, Life)
"The government has made $44 trillion in promises we can't afford to keep. We must get serious now about our long-term budgetary problems, recognizing that the sooner we act, the less painful the choices will be."
- Judd Gregg
(Related: Government, Act, Choices, Now, Problems, Promises, Will)
"Political promises are much like marriage vows. They are made at the beginning of the relationship between candidate and voter, but are quickly forgotten."
- Dick Gregory
(Related: Marriage, Beginning, Promises)
"Show business offers more solid promises than Catholicism."
- John Guare
(Related: Business, Catholicism, Promises)
"The most basic obligation we have to our veterans is that we keep the promises that were made to them. That is what makes the recent failures of the Veterans Administration so shameful."
- Doc Hastings
(Related: Obligation, Promises, Veterans)
"Some people break promises for the pleasure of breaking them."
- William Hazlitt
(Related: People, Pleasure, Promises)
"You don't repair that relationship by sitting down and talking about trust or making promises. Actually, what rebuilds it is living it and doing things differently - and I think that is what is going to make the difference."
- Patricia Hewitt
(Related: Trust, Difference, Living, Promises, Talking)
"Keep every promise you make and only make promises you can keep."
- Anthony Hitt
(Related: Promise, Promises)
"The Europeans had made two promises to the United States if Marshall Plan help was forthcoming. The first promise was maximum self-help on the part of every country; and second, maximum mutual aid."
- Paul Hoffman
(Related: Country, First, Help, Promise, Promises, Self, states, United)
"Liberation is an ever shifting horizon, a total ideology that can never fulfill its promises. It has the therapeutic quality of providing emotionally charged rituals of solidarity in hatred - it is the amphetamine of its believers."
- Arianna Huffington
(Related: Quality, Hatred, Ideology, Promises, Rituals, Solidarity)
"We cannot sacrifice innocent human life now for vague and exaggerated promises of medical treatments thirty of forty years from now. There are ways to pursue this technology and respect life at the same time."
- Ernest Istook
(Related: Life, Medical, Technology, Time, Sacrifice, Now, Promises, Respect, Years)
"I weep for the liberty of my country when I see at this early day of its successful experiment that corruption has been imputed to many members of the House of Representatives, and the rights of the people have been bartered for promises of office."
- Andrew Jackson
(Related: People, Successful, Corruption, Country, Day, Rights, Liberty, Office, Promises)
"If we deliver on those promises, we'll have done our job, and we did it with PSOne, and we certainly did it with PS2, and we are about to do it very rapidly with PSP. This is a whole new business for us, in terms of the handheld market, and we're going about it the right way."
- Ian Jackson
(Related: Business, Job, Promises, Right)
"I think it's going to deliver on the promises we've said it's going to and it is going to be the most successful product ever to come into the handheld environment, and it just happens to have a number of different functions."
- Ian Jackson
(Related: Successful, Environment, Promises)
"If a slave is unwilling to go with his new master, he is whipped, or locked up in jail, until he consents to go, and promises not to run away during the year."
- Harriet Ann Jacobs
(Related: Promises)
"It makes my heart sick when I remember all the good words and the broken promises."
- Chief Joseph
(Related: Heart, Promises, Words)
"The future is a bright as the promises of God."
- Adoniram Judson
(Related: God, Future, Promises)
"The man who promises everything is sure to fulfil nothing, and everyone who promises too much is in danger of using evil means in order to carry out his promises, and is already on the road to perdition."
- Carl Jung
(Related: Danger, Evil, Man, Nothing, Order, Promises, Road)
"Certain it is that a great responsibility rests upon the statesmen of all nations, not only to fulfill the promises for reduction in armaments, but to maintain the confidence of the people of the world in the hope of an enduring peace."
- Frank B. Kellogg
(Related: Peace, People, Hope, Confidence, Nations, Promises, Responsibility, World)
"Part of Washington keeping its promises is a focus on directing more dollars into our local classrooms."
- Mark Kennedy
(Related: Focus, Promises, Washington)
"But the best thing Washington can do for education is realize that our role is limited. Washington must keep its promises, but let those who know our childrens' names- parents, teachers and school board members- make education decisions."
- Mark Kennedy
(Related: Education, Decisions, Names, Parents, Promises, School, Teachers, Washington)
"The politician's promises of yesterday are the taxes of today."
- Mackenzie King
(Related: Promises, Taxes, Today, Yesterday)
"With these kinds of proposals, the devil is in the details. We're going to examine this realignment closely. We will fight any measure that compromises our needs - now or in the future."
- John B. Larson
(Related: Devil, Fight, Future, Measure, Needs, Now, Will)
"It is hard to cement any relations with any country based on promises that may not be deliverable."
- Jim Leach
(Related: Country, May, Promises)
"Our markets have not achieved their great successes as a result of government fiat, but rather through efforts of competing interests working to meet the demands of investors and to fulfill the promises posed by advancing technology."
- Arthur Levitt
(Related: Government, Technology, Promises, Result)
"Since Social Security faces a large gap between what it promises younger workers and what it can afford to pay them, private savings will likely need to play a larger role in retirement planning for younger workers."
- Ron Lewis
(Related: Faces, Planning, Play, Promises, Retirement, Security, Will, Workers)
"Promises that you make to yourself are often like the Japanese plum tree - they bear no fruit."
- Francis Marion
(Related: Promises)
"There is only one thing more harmful to society than an elected official forgetting the promises he made in order to get elected; that's when he doesn't forget them."
- John McCarthy
(Related: Society, Forget, Order, Promises)
"The promises of this world are, for the most part, vain phantoms; and to confide in one's self, and become something of worth and value is the best and safest course."
- Michelangelo
(Related: Promises, Self, Value, World, Worth)
"When one gets old and they are sick, there are not many things they can count on but they should be able to count on Social Security. Our seniors' retirement should never rely on the bull of political promises or the bear of the market."
- Barbara Mikulski
(Related: Old, Promises, Retirement, Security)
"Our seniors' retirement should never rely on the bull of political promises or the bear of the market."
- Barbara Mikulski
(Related: Promises, Retirement)
"The god of the Christians, as we have seen, is the god who makes promises only to break them; who sends them pestilence and disease in order to heal them; a god who demoralizes mankind in order to improve it."
- Johann Most
(Related: God, Disease, Mankind, Order, Promises)
"Now, what we are not talking about, what you're really coming to, is what compromises one makes so that the listener understands somewhat of what you're doing, what you're trying to express."
- Leo Ornstein
(Related: Now, Talking, Trying)
"This Congress has promised all manner of border security and port security to the tune of billions of dollars... yet we have - to date - funded our promises for port security at only $900 million. That's quite a distance between what we say and what we actually do."
- Solomon Ortiz
(Related: Congress, Promises, Security)
"Education should be one of our top funding priorities; talking about it does not help the teachers and students who desperately need promises fulfilled."
- Solomon Ortiz
(Related: Education, Help, Priorities, Promises, Students, Talking, Teachers)
"Everyone's a millionaire where promises are concerned."
- Ovid
(Related: Promises)
"The dreams which reveal the supernatural are promises and messages that God sends us directly: they are nothing but His angels, His ministering spirits , who usually appear to us when we are in a great predicament."
- Paracelsus
(Related: Dreams, God, Angels, Nothing, Promises, Spirits, Supernatural)
"Promises are like crying babies in a theater, they should be carried out at once."
- Norman Vincent Peale
(Related: Babies, Promises, Theater)
"He was a man, he always performed his promises."
- Zebulon Pike
(Related: Man, Promises)
"Have you ever found any logical reason why mutual promises are sufficient consideration for one another (like the two lean horses of a Calcutta hack who can only just stand together)? I have not."
- Frederick Pollock
(Related: Consideration, Horses, Promises, Reason)
"But just as they did in Philadelphia when they were writing the constitution, sooner or later, you've got to compromise. You've got to start making the compromises that arrive at a consensus and move the country forward."
- Colin Powell
(Related: Compromise, Constitution, Country, Writing)
"Allowing our government to kill citizens compromises the deepest moral values upon which this country was conceived: the inviolable dignity of human persons."
- Helen Prejean
(Related: Government, Values, Country, Dignity)
"After believing in promises made and never fulfilled by Labour, people have become increasingly disenchanted with the process assuming that all politicians will say anything to gain power, and then never follow through."
- Adam Rickitt
(Related: Power, People, Gain, Politicians, Promises, Will)
"I knew I would read all kinds of books and try to get at what it is that makes good writers good. But I made no promises that I would write books a lot of people would like to read."
- Carl Sandburg
(Related: People, Books, Promises, Writers)
"A series is filled with compromises."
- William Shatner
"The romantic idea is that everybody around a writer must suffer for his talent. I think a writer is a citizen of humanity, part of his nation, part of his family. He may have to make some compromises."
- Irwin Shaw
(Related: Family, Talent, Idea, Humanity, May, Nation, Romantic, Writer)
"You know, to address crowds and make promises does not require very much brains."
- Eduard Shevardnadze
(Related: Crowds, Promises)
"What writer wants to make compromises with story? Story is the only reason you're in it."
- David Simon
(Related: Reason, Writer)
"When a man has been consistently battering his wife, he shouldn't expect a bouquet of roses from her the morning after he promises to stop."
- Joe Slovo
(Related: Wife, Man, Promises, Roses)
"Every thoughtful and kind-hearted person must regard with interest any device or plan which promises to enable at least the more intelligent, enterprising, and determined part of those who are not capitalists to cease to labor for hire."
- Leland Stanford
(Related: Interest, Labor, Promises, Thoughtful)
"The President has kept all of the promises he intended to keep."
- George Stephanopoulos
(Related: President, Promises)
"The saloon is a liar. It promises good cheer and sends sorrow."
- Billy Sunday
(Related: Promises, Sorrow)
"Promises and pie-crust are made to be broken."
- Jonathan Swift
(Related: Promises)
"The event of the landing of these brethren upon our shores is to be, not without its beneficial effect, as well to the colored population of this country, as it promises to be to ill-fated Africa."
- Lewis Tappan
(Related: Country, Effect, Population, Promises)
"You can't substitute promise after promise with known violators of prior promises at the expense of protecting ourselves or setting an example."
- Fred Thompson
(Related: Example, Promise, Promises)
"When we acquired California and New- Mexico this party, scorning all compromises and all concessions, demanded that slavery should be forever excluded from them, and all other acquisitions of the Republic, either by purchase or conquest, forever."
- Robert Toombs
(Related: Conquest, Party, Slavery)
"I try to take people one at a time, with all the contradictions and compromises that most of us live with."
- Garry Trudeau
(Related: Time, People)
"And as the circumcised in the flesh, and not in the heart, have no part in God's good promises; even so they that be baptized in the flesh, and not in heart, have no part in Christ's blood."
- William Tyndale
(Related: God, Heart, Blood, Christ, Promises)
"I am a journalist in the field of etiquette. I try to find out what the most genteel people regularly do, what traditions they have discarded, what compromises they have made."
- Amy Vanderbilt
(Related: People, Etiquette, Traditions)
"One promises much, to avoid giving little."
- Marquis De Vauvenargues
(Related: Giving, Promises)
"Losers make promises they often break. Winners make commitments they always keep."
- Denis Waitley
(Related: Promises)
"It is a curious thing... that every creed promises a paradise which will be absolutely uninhabitable for anyone of civilized taste."
- Evelyn Waugh
(Related: Paradise, Promises, Taste, Will)
"Beauty always promises, but never gives anything."
- Simone Weil
(Related: Beauty, Promises)
"An ounce of performance is worth pounds of promises."
- Mae West
(Related: Performance, Promises, Worth)
"As I look back over fifty years of ministry, I recall innumerable tests, trials and times of crushing pain. But through it all, the Lord has proven faithful, loving, and totally true to all his promises."
- David Wilkerson
(Related: Pain, Promises, Tests, Trials, Years)
"But as the arms-control scholar Thomas Schelling once noted, two things are very expensive in international life: promises when they succeed and threats when they fail."
- Fareed Zakaria
(Related: Promises, Succeed)