An idealist is one who, on noticing that roses smell better than a cabbage, concludes that it will also make better soup. – Henry L. Mencken

So ultimately, it’s idealistic to think that artists are able to step away from the power of the media and the way it controls things, and go on doing their own things. – Thom Yorke

A man has honor if he holds himself to an ideal of conduct though it is inconvenient, unprofitable, or dangerous to do so. – Walter Lippmann

All men are homosexual, some turn straight. It must be very odd to be a straight man because your sexuality is hopelessly defensive. It’s like an ideal of racial purity. – Derek Jarman

No period of history has ever been great or ever can be that does not act on some sort of high, idealistic motives, and idealism in our time has been shoved aside, and we are paying the penalty for it. – Alfred North Whitehead

Everything about my teenage life was almost ideal. – Esther Williams

I shall ask no more than that you agree with Dean Inge that even though counting heads is not an ideal way to govern, at least it is better than breaking them. – Learned Hand

Idealism increases in direct proportion to one’s distance from the problem. – John Galsworthy

I have an idealistic view of science as a liberalising and progressive force for humanity. – Paul Nurse

I’ve made seventeen or eighteen films now, only two of which have been original screenplays, all the others have been based on short stories or novels, and I find the long short story ideal for adaptation. – Satyajit Ray

Though I believe in liberalism, I find it difficult to believe in liberals. – G.K. Chesterton

We are all inclined to judge ourselves by our ideals; others, by their acts. – Harold Nicolson

Ideal conversation must be an exchange of thought, and not, as many of those who worry most about their shortcomings believe, an eloquent exhibition of wit or oratory. – Emily Post

In one word, this ideal is that you are divine. – Swami Vivekananda

If I just produce the transparent ideal accepted by the Western experts, a process of privatization which will be very good but never happen, that means nothing. – Anatoly Chubais

It might be said that it is the ideal of the employer to have production without employees and the ideal of the employee is to have income without work. – E. F. Schumacher

Every dogma has its day, but ideals are eternal. – Israel Zangwill

A formally recognized equality does, however, accord the smaller nations a position which they should be able to use increasingly in the interest of humanity as a whole and in the service of the ideal. – Hjalmar Branting

Everything that is, was, and will be, eternally IS, even the countless forms, which are finite and perishable only in their objective, not in their ideal Form. – H. P. Blavatsky

The truth is that neither British nor American imperialism was or is idealistic. It has always been driven by economic or strategic interests. – Charley Reese

For the first time, the weird and the stupid and the coarse are becoming our cultural norms, even our cultural ideal. – Carl Bernstein

A democracy, the realistic observer is forced to conclude, is likely to be idealistic in its feelings about itself, but imperialistic about its practice. – Irving Babbitt

My music is all about an idealistic human personality. I have 19th-century ideals. – Gordon Getty

Idealistic reformers are dangerous because their idealism has no roots in love, but is simply a hysterical and unbalanced rage for order amidst their own chaos. – William Irwin Thompson

An ideal wife is any woman who has an ideal husband. – Booth Tarkington

It would be ideal if we could have an uncontrolled flow of information. But we realized you can’t do that. – John Poindexter

My idea of the ideal sex education site doesn’t exist. – Susie Bright

Look for someone who has a complete life without you in it. If you have a person you don’t need for anything, that’s ideal. You’re just together because you really want to be. – Kirstie Alley

Nothing is more idealistic than a journalist on the defensive. – Melvin Maddocks

Some people never have anything except ideals. – E.W. Howe