'Hearts are the strongest when they beat in response to noble ideals.'

A quote by Ralph Bunche

"The well-being and the hopes of the peoples of the world can never be served until peace - as well as freedom, honor and self-respect - is secure."

'Few will have the greatness to bend history itself, but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation.'

- Senator Robert F. Kennedy (1925–1968)

'No army can withstand the strength of an idea whose time has come.'

-Author Victor Hugo (1802-1885)

'Men and nature must work hand in hand. The throwing out of balance of the resources of nature throws out of balance also the lives of men.'

- President Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)

'We become not a melting pot but a beautiful mosaic. Different people, different beliefs, different yearnings, different hopes, different dreams.'

- President Jimmy Carter (1924-2024)

'Action indeed is the sole medium of expression for ethics.'

- Jane Addams (1860-1935)

'And I knew that it was better to live out one's absurdity than to die for that of others.'

-Ralph Ellison, from "Invisible Man" (1913-1994)

'If the time is not ripe, we have to ripen the time.'

- Activist Dorothy Height (1912-2010)

'To live is to choose. But to choose well, you must know who you are and what you stand for, where you want to go and why you want to get there.'

- Diplomat Kofi Annan (1938-2018)

Watch writer John Steinbeck's Nobel Prize acceptance speech.

'We are more fulfilled when we are involved in something bigger than ourselves.'

- Astronaut John Glenn (1921–2016)

'Love planted a rose, and the world turned sweet.'

-Author and poet Katharine Lee Bates (1859-1929)

'No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of another.'

-Charles Dickens (1812-1870), in "Our Mutual Friend"

'Voices ought not be measured by how pretty they are. Instead they matter only if they convince you that they are telling the truth.'

- Iconic singer Sam Cooke (1931–1964)

'I love quotations because it is a joy to find thoughts one might have, beautifully expressed with much authority by someone recognized wiser than oneself.'

- Actress and singer Marlene Dietrich (1901-1992)

'I think a hero is an ordinary individual who finds the strength to persevere and endure in spite of overwhelming obstacles.'

- "Superman" actor Christopher Reeve (1952 - 2004)

'I swing big, with everything I've got. I hit big or I miss big. I like to live as big as I can.'

- Baseball legend Babe Ruth (1895-1948)

British Prime Minister Churchill’s speeches rallied the nation

Winston Churchill’s impassioned wartime oratory united Britain’s resolve, transforming fear into defiance and forging a path to continued resistance against Nazi aggression.

'Let us learn to show our friendship for a man when he is alive and not after he is dead.'

Meyer Wolfsheim in F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby"

'It's the repetition of affirmations that leads to belief. And once that belief becomes a deep conviction, things begin to happen.'

- Legendary boxer Muhammad Ali (1942–2016)

'The minute you start talking about what you're going to do if you lose, you have lost.'

- Diplomat George Shultz (1920–2021)

How Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman grappled with the American Civil War

Whitman, whose brother was injured while fighting for the Union, was often overt in his pro-Union poems. Dickinson, whose brother paid to have someone enlist under his name, was more subtle, though equally as affected, as this comparative analysis makes clear.

The Founders placed the pursuit of happiness at the center of good governance

This podcast explores the central place happiness played in the American founding, highlighting the influence of Greek and Roman moral philosophy on the founders’ constitutional ideas.

Many critics dismissed Norman Rockwell as overly sentimental

The painter’s portraits of American life were often dismissed as commercially minded, banal, or kitschy, especially when compared with the more abstract art of the time. Rockwell, however, was undeterred, commenting that he wanted to produce work that would make viewers “want to sigh and smile at the same time.”

Despite the rules, a Nobel Prize in medicine has been awarded posthumously

Ralph Steinman, whose work revealed how dendritic cells activate immune responses, passed away just days before being named a Nobel laureate. Although Nobel Prizes cannot be awarded posthumously, the committee made an exception because they believed he was alive at the time of the decision.

SpongeBob exemplifies Aristotle's philosophy for living well because he understands that happiness doesn't come from external factors like money, recognition, or power.

See the most iconic photos from four decades of LIFE magazine

American short story writer Flannery O'Connor raised 40 peacocks, which became potent symbols for her fiction's elegant violence

The US Constitution is widely regarded as the longest-standing written national constitution still in force—see how it has influenced rights worldwide.

The 19th-century painters of the Hudson River School were among the first American romantics, with portraits that displayed the natural beauty of the young country.

In 1939, baseball star Lou Gehrig delivered his inspirational 'Luckiest Man' speech after retiring due to the health condition that now bears his name.

Famed poet TS Eliot rejected the manuscript for George Orwell's political fable 'Animal Farm,' writing that its criticism of authoritarianism was not 'the right point of view.'

Before writing 'Walden,' transcendentalist Henry David Thoreau nearly burned down his hometown with a campfire that grew out of control.

See a ranking of the best (and worst) Federal Reserve Chairs since 1914 out of the 16 men and women who have held the office since.

Exploring the Larry Bird punch that almost changed March Madness

Sunflowers have long been a symbol of nuclear disarmament because they can extract large amounts of radioactive cesium from soil.

Abraham Lincoln was almost assassinated weeks before his inauguration as he traveled from Illinois to DC through Baltimore in 1861; it took two independent claims for Lincoln to be convinced the threat was real

During the French Revolution, a botanist's letter asking about "dear Rhus" (poison ivy) was intercepted, leading authorities to suspect he was conspiring with the Russians.

Warren Buffett's former professor Benjamin Graham is known as the 'father of value investing,' a strategy in which investors seek to buy stocks trading below their intrinsic worth.

A Yale student wrote a profound essay about the consulting industry's influence on elite college students that was published in a book of her writing after she died in a post-graduation car accident.

Read a deep dive on the 'all-purpose healing' peptide BPC-157.

The American Society of Civil Engineers' infrastructure report card gave the US a C in 2025, its highest grade since the project launched in 1998.

Explore an interactive map of battles from the American Revolution, along with detailed summaries of each engagement

The word 'jazz' evolved from 'jasm,' 19th-century American slang for 'energy'

Clever Hans was a 1900s horse that was believed to be able to solve math equations, tell time, and read and comprehend German, until a psychology student discovered how he got his answers.

Before humans, the Soviet Union and the United States sent animals—including apes, dogs, and cats—to space during the Space Race.

Cultural norms about how to handle the bodies of loved ones in communities in West Africa have hampered Ebola responses.

Salvador Dalí believed he was his own dead brother, who had died nine months before he was born

The name 'Silicon Valley' arose from the founding of Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory in Fairchild Semiconductor in 1956-57, founded near Stanford University in Palo Alto

Gerrymandering works through two techniques: cracking opposing voters across districts to dilute their power, and packing them into a few to waste their votes in lopsided majorities.