Nine-tenths of wisdom is to be wise in time, and at the right time;
Roosevelt writes this in his Autobiography while defending his intervention in Santo Domingo, and he goes on to say that his whole foreign policy rested on acting far enough in advance of a crisis to make serious trouble unlikely.
Do what you can, with what you’ve got, where you are.
Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat.
There is a homely adage which runs, “Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far.”
A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.
A house divided against itself cannot stand.
The rank is but the guinea’s stamp, / The Man’s the gowd for a’ that.