We are always looking to the future; the present does not satisfy us. Our ideal, whatever it may be, lies further on.

No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism.

Ideals are like the stars. We will never reach them, but like the mariners on the sea, we chart our course by them.

Idealism kills every deal.

I’m an idealist. I don’t know where I’m going, but I’m on my way.

Idealism is what precedes experience; cynicism is what follows.

Cynics regarded everybody as equally corrupt. Idealists regarded everybody as equally corrupt, except themselves.

An idealist is a person who helps other people to be prosperous.

Man is born a predestined idealist, for he is born to act. To act is to affirm the worth of an end, and to persist in affirming the worth of an end is to make an ideal.

When they come downstairs from their Ivory Towers, idealists are very apt to walk straight into the gutter.