Strength Then Power Quotes & Sayings

Is it not obvious? What is life but a betrayal? We start out young, full of hope. The sun is good, the world awaits us. But every passing year shows how small you are, how insignificant against the power of the seasons. Then you age. Your strength fails and the world laughs at you through the jeers of younger men. And you die. Alone. Unfulfilled. But sometimes ... sometimes there will come a man who is not insignificant. He can change the world, rob the seasons of their power. He is the sun. — David Gemmell

The opinion that any Monarch receiveth his Power by Covenant, that is to say on Condition, proceedeth from want of understanding this easie truth, that Covenants being but words, and breath, have no force to oblige, contain, constrain, or protect any man, but what it has from the publique Sword; that is, from the untyed hands of that Man, or Assembly of men that hath the Soveraignty, and whose actions are avouched by them all, and performed by the strength of them all, in him united. But when an Assembly of men is made Soveraigne; then no man imagineth any such Covenant to have past in the Institution; for no man is so dull as to say, for example, the People of Rome, made a Covenant with the Romans, to hold the Soveraignty on such or such conditions; which not performed, the Romans might lawfully depose the Roman People. — Thomas Hobbes

To all the women I say, don't ask to be saved by anyone, "my brave baghinis" (tigresses). Remember, if you deem yourselves as sheeps, men will treat you as such, but if you deem yourselves as tigresses, then you are the ones who will shape humanity. — Abhijit Naskar

History may be a nightmare - an endless cycle of violence and oppression. Old victims of domination soon became new perpetrators of domination. We have seen this cycle over and over again: American revolutionaries dominating Indigenous peoples and defending slavery, anti-colonial heroes becoming dictators, anti-racists supporting patriarchy and homophobia, liberals crusading for imperial invasion and occupation. Such a nightmare radically calls into question the power of radical love in human history. For King, if we accept such a nightmare, then only self-destruction awaits us. To dream is to hold death at arm's length. To love is to really be alive in history. Without radical love, nihilism triumphs - "power without compassion, might without morality, and strength without sight."1 — Martin Luther King Jr.

Those rights, then, which God and nature have established, and are therefore called natural rights, such as life and liberty, need not the aid of human laws to be more effectually invested in every man than they are; neither do they receive any additional strength when declared by the municipal laws to be inviolate. On the contrary, no human legislature has power to abridge or destroy them, unless the owner shall himself commit some act that amounts to a forfeiture. — William Blackstone

It is not, I think, a question of when and how the white people will "free" the black and the red people. It is a condescension to believe that we have the power to do that. Until we have recognized in them the full strength and grace of their distinctive humanity we will be able to set no one free, for we will not be free ourselves. When we realize that they possess a knowledge for the lack of which we are incomplete and in pain, then the wound in our history will be healed. Then they will simply be free, among us
and so will we, among ourselves for the first time, and among them. — Wendell Berry

In time of crisis, we summon up our strength. Then, if we are lucky, we are able to call every resource, every forgotten image that can leap to our quickening, every memory that can make us know our power. And this luck is more than it seems to be: it depends on the long preparation of the self to be used. — Muriel Rukeyser

My people sing, we dance, we love. That is our strength. But we also dig. And then we die. Seldom do we get to choose why. That choice is power. That choice has been our only weapon. But it is not enough. — Pierce Brown

If by strength is meant brute strength, then, indeed, is woman less brute than man. If by strength is meant moral power, then woman is immeasurably man's superior. — Mahatma Gandhi

We sometimes have to experience pain for us to have a story to tell. The power to heal from the pain equips us with the strength to rise up again and move beyond it all. We not only become stronger but wise enough to recognize and handle pain in the future. We however, have to learn to let the brick walls fall down so that we can experience true love once more. We must learn from pain and let it lead us to the most beautiful parts of our journey in life. Only then can our stories become fully complete. — Kemi Sogunle

That's a good attitude. You should hate me more, curse me more, and detest me! Then you should take the power of that hatred and use it to survive this rotten world. — Hideaki Sorachi

The healing power of art is not a rhetorical fantasy. Fighting to keep language, language became my sanity and my strength. It still is, and I know of no pain that art cannot assuage. For some, music, for some, pictures, for me, primarily, poetry, whether found in poems or in prose, cuts through noise and hurt, opens the wound to clean it, and then gradually teaches it to heal itself. Wounds need to be taught to heal themselves. — Jeanette Winterson

Woman is the companion of man, gifted with equal mental capacity ... If by strength is meant moral power, then woman is immeasurably man's superior ... If non-violence is the law of our being, the future is with women. — Mahatma Gandhi

To every administrator, in peaceful, unstormy times, it seems that the entire population entrusted to him moves only by his efforts, and in this consciousness of his necessity every administrator finds the chief rewards for his labors and efforts. It is understandable that, as long as the historical sea is calm, it must seem to the ruler-administrator in his frail little bark, resting his pole against the ship of the people and moving along with it, that his efforts are moving the ship. But once a storm arises, the sea churns up, and the ship begins to move my itself, and then the delusion is no longer possible. The ship follows its own enormous, independent course, the pole does not reach the moving ship, and the ruler suddenly, from his position of power, from being a source of strength, becomes an insignificant, useless, and feeble human being. — Leo Tolstoy

...maybe strength in the 21st century isn't about dominance....it's about the capacity to evoke....the ability to spark the enduring bonds of shared values, intrinsic motivation, and mutually committed perseverance. It is, in short, not the power merely to command, subordinate, demean, insult - and then crow about it with impunity. It's the power to inspire, animate, infuse, spark, evoke - and then connect, link, and collaborate, to be a force multiplier. — Umair Haque

We shall not flag nor fail. We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France and on the seas and oceans; we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air. We shall defend our island whatever the cost may be; we shall fight on beaches, landing grounds, in fields, in streets and on the hills. We shall never surrender and even if, which I do not for the moment believe, this island or a large part of it were subjugated and starving, then our empire beyond the seas, armed and guarded by the British Fleet, will carry on the struggle until in God's good time the New World with all its power and might, sets forth to the liberation and rescue of the Old. — Winston S. Churchill

There are people," my father continued, "who are born to be unhappy and to make others unhappy, who are the victims of celestial intrigues incomprehensible to us, guinea pigs for the celestial machinery, rebels allotted the part of a rebel yet born - by the cruel logic of the celestial comedy - with their wings clipped. They are titans without the power of titans, dwarf-titans whose only greatness was given them in the form of a rigid dose of sensitivity that dissolves their trifling strength like alcohol. They follow their star, their sick sensibility, borne along by titanic plans and intentions, but then break like waves against the rocky banks of triviality. The height of the cruelty allotted them in lucidity, that awareness of their own limitations, that sick capacity for dissociation. I look at myself in the role forced on me by the heavens and by fate, conscious of my role at all times yet at the same time unable to resist it with the force of logic or will. — Danilo Kis

Nay, we sometimes proceed so far as to trust in ourselves, and depend on our own power, strength, and abilities. Then it is that God in mere mercy interposes, and breaks us in pieces; humbles, and confounds us, and so empties us of ourselves, that we may be filled with all the fullness of God. Which we cannot be, without being first emptied of that arrogance and self-conceit which stand in perfect opposition to the grace of God. Hence it appears that hope is a MILITANT VIRTUE, fighting against all that confidence in ourselves; all that self-exaltation upon the score of our own gifts, merits, righteousness, prosperity, honours, and riches, in which the natural man reposes all his confidence. The business of hope is to oppose and conquer all these delusions of the devil, and to seek its rest in the sanctuary of God. — Johann Arndt

When we separate ourselves from the rest of the world, the world becomes a lonely and difficult place to live in. When we see ourselves as completely separate, we cannot call upon the power and strength that comes from unity, from being part of a greater whole. In today's world, we buy into the lie that if we do see ourselves as
or make ourselves into
a part of the greater whole, then we'll lose our identity and become nothing more than another face in the crowd, a lemming who does nothing but follow others and never creates his or her own life. Nothing, though, could be further from the truth. — Tom Walsh

Let the church come to God in the strength of a perfect weakness, in the power of a felt helplessness and a child-like confidence, and then, either she has no strength, and has no right to be, or she has a strength that is infinite. Then and thus, will she stretch out the rod over the seas of difficulty that lie before her, and the waters shall divide, and she shall pass through, and sing the song of deliverance. — Mark Hopkins

In his book, Holy Spirit, Revelation and Revolution: Exploring Holy Spirit Dimensions, Reinhard Bonnke says: "Prayer is not enough to rouse a dead church. It needs the power of the Word imbued with the life of the Spirit. Life comes from the living Word. What we can do and what we should do is preach the Word. Praying for God to work is fine, but praying for Him to do what we should be doing is pointless. We cannot send his Spirit anywhere. He moves with us, and He is where we are. We cannot pray for God to save souls and bless people and then wait for something to happen. He sends us with the Word and the Spirit awaits us. It is our privilege to work for him, save souls for him. For anyone who thinks they do not have strength or power, the Word is their strength and their power. There are two important things to note: Holy Spirit meetings without the Word are human meetings, and prayer is not a substitute for the Word." 1 — Steve Bremner

To call woman the weaker sex is a libel; it is man's injustice to woman. If by strength is meant brute strength, then, indeed, is woman less brute than man. If by strength is meant moral power, then woman is immeasurably man's superior. Has she not greater intuition, is she not more self-sacrificing, has she not greater powers of endurance, has she not greater courage? Without her, man could not be. If nonviolence is the law of our being, the future is with woman. Who can make a more effective appeal to the heart than woman?
[To the Women of India (Young India, Oct. 4, 1930)] — Mahatma Gandhi

There is the pain that made me cry,
and then there is the strength that
made me stop crying.
So I am glad the pain came
because without it I would not have
discovered my strength. — Moffat Machingura

Manpower without Unity is not a strength unless it is harmonized and united properly, then it becomes a spiritual power. — Vallabhbhai Patel

Increased spiritual strength is a gift from God which He can give when we push in His service to our limits. Through the power of the Atonement of Jesus Christ, our natures can be changed. Then our power to carry burdens can be increased more than enough to compensate for the increased service we will be asked to give. — Henry B. Eyring

Magnitude may be compared to the power output in kilowatts of a [radio] broadcasting station; local intensity, on the Mercalli or similar scale, is then comparable to the signal strength noted on a receiver at a given locality. Intensity, like signal strength, will generally fall off with distance from the source; it will also depend on local conditions at the point of observation, and to some extent on the conditions along the path from source to that point. — Charles Francis Richter

There and then, sitting beside her and within the strength of my adoration, I felt invincible. — Hisham Matar

What happens when you let go, when your strength leaves you and you sink into darkness, when there's nothing that you or anyone else can do, no matter how desperate you are, no matter how you try? Perhaps it's then, when you have neither pride nor power, that you are saved, brought to an unimaginably great reward. — Mark Halperin

Then sudden Felagund there swaying
Sang in answer a song of staying,
Resisting, battling against power,
Of secrets kept, strength like a tower,
And trust unbroken, freedom, escape;
Of changing and of shifting shape,
Of snares eluded, broken traps,
The prison opening, the chain that snaps. — J.R.R. Tolkien

It is not a dream that someday, nations will be able to settle their difficulties without war, just as individuals now settle their personal feuds without resorting to arguments of physical strength or sharp steel. For, then, humanity will have created international jurisdiction and a power to enforce its laws. — Ellen Key

The same six corporations own the media outlets that we rely on for nearly all of our information. These corporations serve the interest of the central banks. The strength of these corporations lies in the large amounts of money that they generate. If the people were informed of the control these corporations have, then they would stop investing their money towards these companies, and the corporations would lose their power and wealth. It is in the best interest of the government, the corporations and the banks to keep the public uninformed. The biggest tool of maintaining public ignorance is by the control of media outlets that distribute information to the mass population. — Joseph P. Kauffman

If pain sometimes shatters the creature's false self sufficiency, yet in supreme Trial or Sacrifice' it teaches him the self-sufficiency which really ought to be his - the 'strength which, if Heaven gave it may be called his own': for then, in the absence of all merely natural motives and supports he acts in that strength, and that alone, which God confers upon him through his subjected will. Human will becomes truly creative and truly our own when it is wholly God's, and this is one of the many senses in which he that loses his soul shall find it. In all other acts our will is fed through nature, that is, through created things other than the self - through the desires which our physical organism and our heredity supply to us. When we act from ourselves alone, that is, from God in ourselves - we are collaborators in, or live instruments of creation: and that is why such an act undoes with 'backward mutters of deserving power' the uncreative spell which Adam laid upon his species. — C.S. Lewis

Humans are the same. Like polishing a jewel, difficulties polish a person's character. The trials we are given are proportional to our strength. Otherwise we wouldn't be using our true power. And then we wouldn't be able to grow stronger. If a trial is equal to your strength, then it's okay if you come to an impasse. If you do end up at an impasse, then it just means you're trying to move forward and you want to win. That's why you have to keep trying. — Kae Maruya

The political independence of a nation must not be confused with any intellectual isolation. The spiritual freedom, indeed, your own generous lives and liberal air will give you. From us you will learn the classical restraint of form. For all great art is delicate art, roughness having very little to do with strength, and harshness very little to do with power. 'The artist,' as Mr. Swinburne says, 'must be perfectly articulate.' This limitation is for the artist perfect freedom: it is at once the origin and the sign of his strength. So that all the supreme masters of style - Dante, Sophocles, Shakespeare - are the supreme masters of spiritual and intellectual vision also. Love art for its own sake, and then all things that you need will be added to you. — Oscar Wilde

If we do not learn to eliminate waste and to be more productive and more efficient in the ways we use energy, then we will fall short of this goal [for the Nation to derive 20 percent of all the energy we use from the Sun, by 2000]. But if we use our technological imagination, if we can work together to harness the light of the Sun, the power of the wind, and the strength of rushing streams, then we will succeed. — Jimmy Carter

He was tall, one of the tallest men she had ever seen. Dressed in jeans, boots and a cotton shirt. Thick black hair grew rakishly long, falling over the collar of his shirt. Intense brown eyes, almost the color of amber, surveyed the diner slowly before coming back to her. Electricity sizzled in the air then, as though invisible currents connected them, forcing her to recognize him on a primitive level. Not that she wouldn't take notice anyway. He was power, strength, and so incredibly male that her breath caught at the sight of him. — Lora Leigh

I may not have any power over it at the moment, but at some point that must change. I can be very patient. I am the end of all things, nephew mine. I shall be the last. When birth has ended, I wil cut Clotho's cord, and she will be no more. The time will come when every last thread has been measured, and I will snip Lachesis from the great weave. In the end only Death and I will remain. Then I will cut his thread, and it will be me alone. With my last strength I will close the shears on my own life. I am the end of everything, including you. — Kelly McCullough

I cannot explain exactly how we are able to receive the power to serve and to endure through communion with God, but I know it is a fact. Are you in danger of being crushed by a heavy and difficult trial? Then seek communion with Christ and you will receive strength and the power to be victorious, for God has promised, "I will strengthen you" (Isa. 41:10). — Lettie B. Cowman

His angelic wings blackened when the dark fury assailed his mind. Summoning new strength from the unholy power that ravaged his soul, grieved to drastic levels of desperation by the tainting of the holy light within him, he combated ally and enemy alike, bent on destroying both sides in order to ensure the quelling of the dark energies there and then. For days and nights, the lone warrior bathed himself in the blood of angels and demons. And when it was over, he stood alone on contaminated land, with a contaminated soul. He was banned forever from Heaven and not even Hell had space for a creature which seemed to cherish Oblivion over Pandemonium. The dark angel, not so far removed from his former self as his superiors seemed to believe, died on the edge of the cliffs, of utter loneliness and despair. — T.A. Miles

And I've been waiting for you, because I couldn't do anything else. And we've both known that we would meet again, and then it would be all over with life and everything that gave our existence meaning and tension. A secret of the kind that lurks between the two of us has extraordinary power. It burns through the fabric of life like a scorching beam, and yet at the same time it also gives it tensile strength. It forces us to live. — Sandor Marai

Lacking strength beauty hates the understanding for asking of her what it cannot do but the life of spirit is not the life that shrinks from death and keeps itself untouched by devastation, but rather the life that endures it and maintains itself in it. It wins its truth only when, in utter dismemberment, it finds itself. It is this power, not as something positive, which closes its eyes to the negative as when we say of something that it is nothing or is false, and then having done with it, turn away and pass on to something else; on the contrary, spirit is this power only by looking the negative in the face, and tarrying with it. This tarrying with the negative is the magical power that converts it into being. — Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

Eternal life then is a certain kind of life I am living more and more now and will go on forever.17 I am living more and more in connection with God, and I will live connected with God forever. This has huge implications for when I do stumble, when I sin and the old person comes back from the dead for a few moments. I admit it. I confess it. I thank God I am forgiven. I make amends with anyone who has been affected by my actions. And then I move on. Not because sin isn't serious, but because I am taking seriously who God says I am. The point isn't my failure; it is God's success in remaking me into the person he originally intended me to be. God's strength, not mine. God's power, not mine. — Rob Bell

Woman is an incarnation of 'Shakti'- the goddess of power. If she is bestowed with education, Gujarat's strength will double. Let the campaign of 'Kanya Kelavni' be spread in every home. Let the lamp of educating daughters be lit up in every heart. Then only the vision of 'Jay Jay Garvi Gujarat' will be realized. — Narendra Modi

Love is the most powerful force on earth. The end of fear is where love begins. Then nothing can overcome you. — Kate McGahan

Presently he added to himself the power of the horse and the ox, he borrowed the carrying strength of water and the driving force of the wind, he quickened his fire by blowing, and his simple tools, pointed first with copper and then with iron, increased and varied — H.G.Wells

Many years ago a college professor told me the story about the lion tamer and the lion. So here's the clever lion tamer, with his little twirling stick, and there is the lion, prancing obediently to the machinations of the lion tamer. Clearly the lion tamer is in charge. But, asked my professor, who is actually more powerful, the lion tamer or the lion? Obviously it is the lion. Why then does the lion do the bidding of the lion tamer? Because the lion doesn't know its own power. We, the American people, have been exploited and stolen from and we have put up with it at least in part because we are awed by the power of the progressive lion tamers. I admit they do have power, but I am also saying we do not appreciate our own strength. — Dinesh D'Souza

Imagine early hominid life as a tense balance of power between the alpha (and an ally or two) and the larger set of males who are shut out of power. Then arm everyone with spears. The balance of power is likely to shift when physical strength no longer decides the outcome of every fight. That's essentially what happened, Boehm suggests, as our ancestors developed better weapons for hunting and butchering beginning around five hundred thousand years ago, when the archaeological record begins to show a flowering of tool and weapon types.30 Once early humans had developed spears, anyone could kill a bullying alpha male. And if you add the ability to communicate with language, and note that every human society uses language to gossip about moral violations,31 then it becomes easy to see how early humans developed the ability to unite in order to shame, ostracize, or kill anyone whose behavior threatened or simply annoyed the rest of the group. — Jonathan Haidt

People say hate is like a poison - but they're wrong. It's like a drug. You never forget your first hit, how it seduces you with its strength and power, and takes you completely by storm. It colors your world in light and meaning, until you wonder how you ever managed to get by without it. And then, eventually, you get to a point where you can't. It takes over your life, until hating becomes your reason for living. — Nenia Campbell

You must read, you must persevere, you must sit up nights, you must inquire, and exert the utmost power of your mind. If one way does not lead to the desired meaning, take another; if obstacles arise, then still another; until, if your strength holds out, you will find that clear which at first looked dark. — Giovanni Boccaccio

We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender, and even if, which I do not for a moment believe, this Island or a large part of it were subjugated and starving, then our Empire beyond the seas, armed and guarded by the British Fleet, would carry on the struggle, until, in God's good time, the New World, with all its power and might, steps forth to the rescue and the liberation of the old. — Winston S. Churchill

About 10,000 years ago, males and females were acting equitably and were treating one another as equals, and then males took over the power, because they have physical power and physical strength. — Jane Elliot

If we are living under the assumption that we are only one way or another, inside a limited spectrum of human qualities, then we would have to question why more of us aren't wholly satisfied with our lives right now. Why do we have access to so much wisdom yet fail to have the strength and courage to act upon our good intentions by making powerful choices? And most important, why do we continue to act out in ways that go against our value system and all that we stand for? We will assert that it is because of our unexamined life, our darker self, our shadow self where our unclaimed power lies — Deepak Chopra

In ressentiment morality, love for the "small," the "poor," the "weak," and the "oppressed" is really disguised hatred, repressed envy, an impulse to detract, etc., directed against the opposite phenomena: "wealth," "strength," "power," "largesse." When hatred does not dare to come out into the open, it can be easily expressed in the form of ostensible love - love for something which has features that are the opposite of those of the hated object. This can happen in such a way that the hatred remains secret. When we hear that falsely pious, unctuous tone (it is the tone of a certain "socially-minded" type of priest), sermonizing that love for the "small" is our first duty, love for the "humble" inspirit, since God gives "grace" to them, then it is often only hatred posing as Christian love. — Max Scheler

She surrendered then to the pleasure, giving herself over to the power of his touch. Dragging him with her into a sensual haze, reveling in the desire, hiding the strength of her reaction from the man loving her body. Because the truth was that she was no longer in control. Somehow, Evan had wormed his way past her defenses. He'd snuck in and nestled near her heart. And that scared the hell out of her. — Jessica Scott

When we understand the character of God, when we grasp something of His holiness, then we begin to understand the radical character of our sin and hopelessness. Helpless sinners can survive only by grace. Our strength is futile in itself; we are spiritually impotent without the assistance of a merciful God. We may dislike giving our attention to God's wrath and justice, but until we incline ourselves to these aspects of God's nature, we will never appreciate what has been wrought for us by grace. Even Edwards's sermon on sinners in God's hands was not designed to stress the flames of hell. The resounding accent falls not on the fiery pit but on the hands of the God who holds us and rescues us from it. The hands of God are gracious hands. They alone have the power to rescue us from certain destruction. — R.C. Sproul

What are called opinions "on the left" and "on the right" in the media represent only a limited spectrum of debate, which reflects the range of needs of private power - but there's essentially nothing beyond those "acceptable" positions. So what the media do, in effect, is to take the set of assumptions which express the basic ideas of the propaganda system, whether about the Cold War or the economic system or the "national interest" and so on, and then present a range of debate within that framework - so the debate only enhances the strength of the assumptions, ingraining them in people's minds as the entire possible spectrum of opinion that there is. — Noam Chomsky

This is your commitment. This is the time for it. If you are to be an entity, as you have chosen to be, then this is your opportunity, and this is your last reincarnation upon this earth. You need power, strength, determination, and joyous spontaneity in your working hours. You also need to influence personally those people in the outside world with whom you come in daily contact, and to extend yourself in using your full abilities of understanding and creativeness in your outside contacts. You need also to expand in the direction in which you are going, in terms of these sessions and psychological time. — Jane Roberts

And here are trees and I know their gnarled surface, water and I feel its taste. These scents of grass and stars at night, certain evenings when the heart relaxes-how shall I negate this world whose power and strength I feel? Yet all the knowledge on earth will give me nothing to assure me that this world is mine. You describe it to me and you teach me to classify it. You enumerate its laws and in my thirst for knowledge I admit that they are true. You take apart its mechanism and my hope increases. At the final stage you teach me that this wondrous and multicolored universe can be reduced to the atom and that the atom itself can be reduced to the electron. All this is good and I wait for you to continue. But you tell me of an invisible planetary system in which electrons gravitate around a nucleus. You explain this world to me with an image. I realize then that you have been reduced to poetry: I shall never know. — Albert Camus

Be your own source of strength and comfort. Believe that you are in love, happy, and fulfilled because you started by feeling that way about yourself, alone. Then the power of being together is amplified and you will experience the kind of joy that you can't begin to imagine. It starts within you and no one else. — Carol Lin

What do you do when strength is called for and you have no strength? You evoke a power beyond your own and use stamina you did not know you had. You open your eyes in the morning grateful that you can see the sunlight of yet another day. You draw yourself to the edge of the bed and then put one foot in front of the other and keep going. You weep with those who gently close the eyes of the dead, and somehow, from the salt of your tears, comes endurance for them and for you. You pour out that resurgence to minister to the living. — Catherine Marshall

Men as fit as you, when your everyday strength is gone, can draw on a mysterious reservoir of power far greater. Then it is that you can reach for the stars. That is the way champions are made. - George Yeoman Pocock O — Daniel James Brown

There is a great difference, then, between "power" and "authority." Power refers to one's ability to coerce others (through physical, economic, or other means) to do one's bidding. One can possess the means of power: physical strength, armaments, and money. But authority must be performed. Authority refers to one's ability to gain the trust and willing obedience of others. While power rests on intimidation, authority survives through inspiration. — Joshua Meyrowitz

He was quiet for a moment, and then he said, Do you understand a little better now? What it's like to face a power so alien? To face an enemy with such unnatural strength? — Leigh Bardugo

The Christian living in disobedience also lives devoid of joy and hope. But when he begins to understand that Christ has delivered him from the reign of sin, when he begins to see that he is united to Him who has all power and authority and that it is possible to walk in obedience, he begins to have hope, and as he hopes in Christ, he begins to have joy. In the strength of this joy, he begins to overcome the sins that have so easily entangle him. He then finds that the joy of a holy walk is infinitely more satisfying than the fleeting pleasures of sin. But to experience this joy, we must make some choices. We must choose to forsake sin, not only because it is defeating to us but because it grieves the heart of God. — Jerry Bridges

If a woman is interested in her own struggle into identity and power, then she will be interested in other women. The lives of these, and other women, show me what a woman can do even without formal power, education, or rights, in a world dominated by men. They are inspirational examples of the strength of the female spirit. — Philippa Gregory

In holding your antagonist, therefore, you should hold him lightly as if your arms were nothing but chains which connect you with him, so that you may stretch or contract them at will when necessary, and pull or push him in any direction you choose. If you pull your opponent or apply your tricks on him by putting from the beginning too much strength in your arms, then you are going to contest with him by means of your power and against the principles of Judo. In doing so, you can never expect to succeed in your contest. — Yokoyama Sakujiro

Women's liberation, if not the most extreme then certainly the most influential neo-Marxist movement in America, has done to the American home what communism did to the Russian economy, and most of the ruin is irreversible. By defining relations between men and women in terms of power and competition instead of reciprocity and cooperation, the movement tore apart the most basic and fragile contract in human society, the unit from which all other social institutions draw their strength. — Ruth Wisse

Music makes us want to live. You don't know how many times people have told me that they'd been down and depressed and just wanted to die. But then a special song caught their ear and that helped give them renewed strength. That's the power music has. — Mary J. Blige

The ship founders on a sandbank and then gets back afloat. Electric power stops; after a while, the machines start up again. During such recesses, the anarch measures his own strength and autonomy. — Ernst Junger

I systematically break guys down. I get in the ring and they say I don't have any power but then they feel me and feel my strength. — Timothy Bradley

Maybe you feel so consumed with the pull of your desire that you wonder if there is still hope for you. Perhaps you feel so beaten down by a certain trial in your life that you don't know if you will ever have the strength to get up again. Maybe you are so exhausted from your attempt to juggle all the different idols begging for your attention that you're on the verge of collapse. If you want to have genuine faith in a God who has the power to stand with you in the fire and bring you out unharmed, then I beg you to examine your faith, as Scripture tells us to do: Examine yourselves to see if your faith is genuine. — Kasey Van Norman

In fact the system of collective contribution, levy of a tenth, and redistribution to the participants, is the schema of the sacrificial rite (one provides the victim; the god, the temple, the priests levy a tenth, then redistribution takes place: redistribution that imparts a new strength and power to those who benefit from it, deriving from the sacrifice itself).

The game - sacrifice, division, levy, redistribution - is a religious form of individual and group invigoration which has been transposed into a social practice involving the resolution of a class conflict. — Michel Foucault

Love hath so long possess'd me for his own
And made his lordship so familiar
That he, who at first irk'd me, is now grown
Unto my heart as its best secrets are.
And thus, when he in such sore wise doth mar
My life that all its strength seems gone from it.
Mine inmost being then feels thoroughly quit
Of anguish, and all evil keeps afar.
Love also gathers to such power in me
That my sighs speak, each one a grievous thing.
Always soliciting
My Gabriel's salutation piteously.
Whenever he beholds me, it is so,
Who is more sweet than any words can show. — Sylvain Reynard

To generate great power you must first totally relax and gather your strength, and then concentrate your mind and all your strength on hitting your target. — Joe Hyams

The power to cause pain is the only power that matters, the power to kill and destroy, because if you can't kill then you are always subject to those who can, and nothing and one will ever save you. — Orson Scott Card