The optimist thinks this is the best of all worlds. The pessimist fears it is true.

—J. Robert Oppenheimer

Everybody, my friend, everybody lives for something better to come. That’s why we want to be considerate of every man — who knows what’s in him, why he was born and what he can do?

—Maxim Gorky

Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.

—Dr Martin Luther King, Jr

The accumulation of small, optimistic acts produces quality in our culture and in your life. Our culture resonates in tense times to individual acts of grace.

—Jennifer James

Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year.

—Ralph Waldo Emerson

Stick with the optimists. It’s going to be tough enough even if they’re right.

—James Reston

Positive thinking won’t let you do anything but it will let you do everything better than negative thinking will.

—Zig Ziglar

The pessimist borrows trouble; the optimists lend encouragement.

—William Arthur Ward

Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier.

—Colin Powell

Both optimists and pessimists contribute to our society. The optimist invents the airplane and the pessimist the parachute.

—Gil Stern

The nice part about being a pessimist is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised.

—George F. Will

A pessimist is one who makes difficulties of his opportunities and an optimist is one who makes opportunities of his difficulties.

—Harry Truman

Optimists are nostalgic about the future.

—Chicago Tribune

It’s still possible to be a cockeyed optimist these days — you just have to be a little more cockeyed.

—Robert Brault

Pessimist: One who, when he has the choice of two evils, chooses both.

—Oscar Wilde