Named source · 1899

The Strenuous Life Quotes by Theodore Roosevelt: Context & Meanings

2 quotations linked to The Strenuous Life by or associated with Theodore Roosevelt, with source notes, explanations and related topics.

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Theodore Roosevelt’s 1899 address The Strenuous Life

Topics and ideas

Effort, courage, participation, failure, success, duty and Roosevelt’s case for active public and personal exertion over comfortable disengagement.

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2 quotations with source context and meaning

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“It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed.”

Theodore Roosevelt

Meaning & context

Roosevelt contrasts the disappointment of an unsuccessful attempt with the deeper loss of never attempting worthwhile work at all, making participation and effort more important than guaranteed success.

Source details

The Strenuous Life, speech before the Hamilton Club, Chicago, April 10, 1899; Project Gutenberg #58821. The sentence appears in Roosevelt’s opening argument for active effort and immediately follows his praise of the person who embodies “victorious effort”; it is preserved as historical motivational rhetoric rather than a promise that effort always produces success.

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