“This process of election affords a moral certainty that the office of President will seldom fall to the lot of any man who is not in an eminent degree endowed with the requisite qualifications.” — Alexander Hamilton
The phrasing all depends on which translation you are reading, but I had the following words over my desk at college to get me through those dark periods of self-doubt:
“Everything is in a man’s hands and he lets it all slip past his nose, it is from cowardice…that’s an axiom. I wonder, though what people fear most. It seems to me it is taking a new step or uttering a new sound.”
My Dog Ate a Lightbulb 