Starfleet Captains Greatest Quotes

 Starfleet Captains Greatest Quotes

"Up until about a hundred years ago, there was one question that burned in every human, that made us study the stars and dream of traveling to them: are we alone?  Our generation is privileged to know the answer to that question.  We are all explorers, driven to know what's over the horizon, what's beyond our own shores.  And yet, the more I've experienced, the more I've learned that no matter how far we travel, or how fast we get there, the most profound discoveries are not necessarily beyond that next star.  They're within us, woven into the threads that bind us, all of us, to each other.  The final frontier begins in this hall. Let's explore it together."

-Captain Jonathan Archer, Enterprise NX-01

"Universal law is for lackeys; context is for kings."

-Captain Gabriel Lorca, USS Discovery

"The real world doesn't always adhere to logic.  Sometimes down is up.  Sometimes up is down.  Sometimes when you're lost, you're found."

-Captain Michael Burnham, USS Discovery

"I come to ask myself the same question that young soldier asked the general all those years ago: "how do I defeat fear?"  The general's answer: the only way to defeat fear is to tell it "no."  No.  We will not take shortcuts on the path to righteousness.  No.  We will not break the rules that protect us from our basest instincts.  No.  We will not allow desperation to destroy moral authority.  I am guilty of all these things.  Some say that in life, there are no second chances.  Experience tells me that this is true.  But we can only look forward.  We have to be torchbearers, casting the light so we may see our path to lasting peace.  We will continue exploring, discovering new worlds, new civilizations.  Yes.  That is the United Federation of Planets.  Yes.  That is Starfleet.  Yes.  That is who we are.  And who we will always be."

-Captain Michael Burnham, USS Discovery

"Before we can care for others, we must care for ourselves."

-Captain Saru, USS Discovery

“Earth.  The dust and sky is my hearth, but Enterprise is my home.  We can go forward together, knowing that whatever shadows we bring with us, they make the light all the brighter.  I am a lucky man.”

-Captain Christopher Pike, USS Enterprise

"The greatest danger facing us is ourselves, an irrational fear of the unknown.  But there’s no such thing as the unknown — only things temporarily hidden, temporarily not understood.”

-Captain James T. Kirk, USS Enterprise

"Risk is our business.  That's what this starship is all about.  That's why we’re aboard her."

-Captain James T. Kirk, USS Enterprise

"Were I to invoke logic, logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few."

-Captain Spock, USS Enterprise

"You are my superior officer.  You are also my friend.  I have been and always shall be yours."

-Captain Spock, USS Enterprise, to Admiral James T. Kirk

"We are assembled here today to pay final respects to our honored dead.  And yet it should be noted that in the midst of our sorrow, this death takes place in the shadow of new life, the sunrise of a new world.  A world that our beloved comrade gave his life to protect and nourish.  He did not feel this sacrifice a vain or empty one, and we will not debate his profound wisdom at these proceedings.  Of my friend I can only say this: of all the souls I have encountered in my travels, his was the most... Human."

-Admiral James T. Kirk, USS Enterprise

"Captain's Log, Stardate 9529.1.  This is the final cruise of the Starship Enterprise under my command.  This ship and her history will shortly become the care of a new generation.  To them and their posterity will we commit our future.  They will continue the voyages we have begun, and journey to all the undiscovered countries, boldly going where no man... where no one has gone before."

-Captain James T Kirk, USS Enterprise-A

"You'll find that more happens on the bridge of a starship than just carrying out orders and observing regulations.  There is a sense of loyalty to the men and women you serve with, a sense of family.  Those two men on trial... I served with them for a long time.  I owe them my life a dozen times over.  And right now they're in trouble, and I'm going to help them.  Let the regulations be damned."

-Captain Hikaru Sulu, USS Excelsior

"Let’s make sure history never forgets the name Enterprise."

-Captain Jean-Luc Picard, USS Enterprise-D (in an alternate timeline)

"There are some words I've known since I was a school boy.  'With the first link, the chain is forged.  The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably.'  Those words were uttered by Judge Aaron Satie as wisdom and warning.  The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged."

-Captain Jean-Luc Picard, USS Enterprise-D

"They invade our space and we fall back.  They assimilate entire worlds, and we fall back.  Not again!  The line must be drawn here, this far, no further!  And I will make them pay for what they've done!"

-Captain Jean-Luc Picard, USS Enterprise-E

"That might be the most important thing to understand about Humans.  It's the unknown that defines our existence.  We are constantly searching, not just for answers to our questions, but for new questions."

-Commander Benjamin Sisko, Deep Space Nine

"Do you know what the trouble is?  The trouble is Earth.  On Earth there is no poverty, no crime, no war.  You look out the window of Starfleet headquarters and you see paradise.  Well, it's easy to be a saint in paradise, but the Maquis do not live in paradise.  Out there in the Demilitarized zone, all the problems haven't been solved yet.  Out there, there are no saints, just people.  Angry, scared, determined people who are going to do whatever it takes to survive whether it meets with Federation approval or not."

-Commander Benjamin Sisko, Deep Space Nine

"I lied.  I cheated.  I bribed men to cover the crimes of other men.  I am an accessory to murder. But the most damaging thing of all... I think I can live with it.  And if I had to do it all over again, I would.   Garak was right about one thing, a guilty conscience is a small price to pay for the safety of the Alpha Quadrant."

-Captain Benjamin Sisko, Deep Space Nine

"We're alone in an uncharted part of the galaxy.  We have already made some friends here, and some enemies.  We have no idea of the dangers we're going to face, but one thing is clear.  Both crews are going to have to work together if we're to survive.  That's why Commander Chakotay and I have agreed that this should be one crew.  A Starfleet crew.  And as the only Starfleet vessel assigned to the Delta Quadrant, we'll continue to follow our directive to seek out new worlds and explore space.  But our primary goal is clear.  Even at maximum speeds, it would take seventy five years to reach the Federation, but I'm not willing to settle for that.  There's another entity like the Caretaker out there somewhere who has the ability to get us there a lot faster.  We'll be looking for her, and we'll be looking for wormholes, spatial rifts, or new technologies to help us.  Somewhere along this journey, we'll find a way back." 

-Captain Kathryn Janeway, USS Voyager

"Our ship might not be the biggest, and we might do the missions nobody else wants, but we are still Starfleet."

-Captain Carol Freeman, USS Cerritos 

"That leads me to First Officer Hansen.  More accurately, Seven of Nine.  Hell, I'm a relic of an older time.  By the book.  By God, the book is boring.  Hansen is reckless.  She's unrelenting, doesn't give a damn about protocol or procedure.  However... she is brave and loyal and... the book that she writes is gonna be great.  And the rules that she breaks... maybe they were broken to begin with.  So, in light of that, I have a recommendation: promotion to Captain when we return to port."

-Captain Liam Shaw, USS Titan-A

"I'm not asking you to give your lives for nothing.  I'm asking you to fight for what's below.  Your families, your children.  The Borg have taken our crew, taken our captain.  But in this moment, here and now, we are all that is left of Starfleet.  It's up to us."

-Acting Captain Seven of Nine, USS Titan-A

"Democracy doesn’t live in a place, it lives in continued action.  So go out and seek, explore and innovate.  Boldly go where no one has gone before."

-Captain Nahla Ake, USS Athena and Commandant of Starfleet Academy

Bonus:

"Why explore space?  Why, indeed, did we trouble to look past the next mountain?  Our Prime obligation to ourselves is to make the unknown known.  We are on a journey to keep an appointment with whatever we are."

-Gene Roddenberry, creator of Star Trek