Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 - 1882), Essays, First Series: Prudence, 1841
No great deed, private or public, had ever been undertaken in a bliss of certainty.
Leon Wieseltier, in The New Republic
The real hero is always a hero by mistake; he dreams of being an honest coward like everybody else.
Umberto Eco (1932 - ), Travels in Hyperreality
The best of us must sometimes eat our words.
J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets, 1999