Quotations on Dreams

He felt that his whole life was some kind of dream and he sometimes wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it.

~ Douglas Adams

- The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

You see things; and you say, 'Why?' But I dream things that never were; and I say, "Why not?"

~ George Bernard Shaw

- "Back to Methuselah" (1921), part 1, act 1

I've come to believe that each of us has a personal calling that's as unique as a fingerprint - and that the best way to succeed is to discover what you love and then find a way to offer it to others in the form of service, working hard, and also allowing the energy of the universe to lead you.

~ Oprah Winfrey

- O Magazine, September 2002

The key to realizing a dream is to focus not on success but significance - and then even the small steps and little victories along your path will take on greater meaning.

~ Oprah Winfrey

- O Magazine, September 2002

If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.

~ Henry David Thoreau

If one advances confidently in the directions of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.

~ Henry David Thoreau

Hope is a waking dream.

~ Aristotle

- from Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers

The more a man dreams, the less he believes.

~ H.L. Mencken

We need men who can dream of things that never were.

~ John F. Kennedy

- speech in Dublin, Ireland, June 28, 1963

Good thoughts are no better than good dreams, unless they be executed.

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

What if nothing exists and we're all in somebody's dream? Or what's worse, what if only that fat guy in the third row exists?

~ Woody Allen

- Without Feathers

Keep true to the dreams of thy youth.

~ Friedrich von Schiller

To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe.

~ Anatole France

I know how men in exile feed on dreams of hope.

~ Aeschylus

Nothing happens unless first a dream.

~ Carl Sandburg

The end of wisdom is to dream high enough to lose the dream in the seeking of it.

~ William Faulkner

Now, I say to you today my friends, even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: - 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.'

~ Martin Luther King Jr

- Speech at Civil Rights March on Washington, August 28, 1963

The wisest men follow their own direction.

~ Euripides

Dreams that do come true can be as unsettling as those that don't.

~ Brett Butler

- Knee Deep in Paradise

To want to be what one can be is purpose in life.

~ Cynthia Ozick

- O Magazine, September 2002

Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night.

~ Edgar Allan Poe

- Eleonora

Human beings have an inalienable right to invent themselves.

~ Germaine Greer

- O Magazine, September 2002

They say dreams are the windows of the soul - take a peek and you can see the inner workings, the nuts and bolts.

~ Henry Bromel

- Northern Exposure, The Big Kiss, 1991

Dreams come true. Without that possibility, nature would not incite us to have them.

~ John Updike

Last night I dreamed I ate a ten-pound marshmallow, and when I woke up the pillow was gone.

~ Tommy Cooper

Dreaming is an act of pure imagination, attesting in all men a creative power, which, if it were available in waking, would make every man a Dante or Shakespeare.

~ H.F. Hedge

The smaller the head, the bigger the dream.

~ Austin O'Malley

People who insist on telling their dreams are among the terrors of the breakfast table.

~ Max Beerbohm