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Who really said it

You are never too old to set another goal, or to dream a new dream

Not C.S. Lewis — actually Les Brown Les Brown b. 1945 · American motivational speaker & author
Disputed In copyright

There is no evidence C.S. Lewis ever wrote or said this — it appears in none of his books, letters, or in The Quotable Lewis. Quote Investigator traces the earliest documented appearance to motivational speaker Les Brown’s 1992 book Live Your Dreams, and credits Brown as the likely originator.

Last verified 8 Jul 2026 · how we verify · spot an error?

For presentations

Put it on a slide

Disputed credit — copy with the correction

“You are never too old to set another goal, or to dream a new dream” Attributed to C.S. Lewis, but there is no source in his works. The earliest documented appearance is Les Brown's 1992 book Live Your Dreams; Quote Investigator credits Brown as the likely originator.

The slide-ready mistake: crediting this to C.S. Lewis. Use the credit shown above instead.

Can you use it?

Still under copyright (rights held by Les Brown / HarperCollins (William Morrow)). A short, credited quote is generally fine for talks, teaching, and internal decks; for commercial, published, or large-scale reuse, get permission.

Image direction — grounded in this quote’s real context; paste into your image tool

In context

Evoking the world of Les Brown — American motivational speaker & author. Theme: "You are never too old to set another goal, or to dream a new dream". Atmospheric and restrained, cinematic directional light, a muted period-appropriate palette, fine grain and texture. Compose with generous empty space for the quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.

Minimalist

Minimalist editorial slide for the quote "You are never too old to set another goal, or to dream a new dream". Clean background, a single muted accent color, generous negative space, subtle paper or linen texture, no literal illustration — let the words carry it. Reserve clear space for a serif quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.

Provenance

The real trail

Popularly credited to
C.S. Lewis (unsupported)
Earliest documented
Les Brown, Live Your Dreams
First appeared
1992 (William Morrow & Co.)
Status
Misattributed to Lewis

You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.

As documented by Quote Investigator in Les Brown’s 1992 book Live Your Dreams, in a section titled “Never Too Old to Be Bold.” No comparable wording has been found in any work by C.S. Lewis.

Quote Investigator: full investigation

How we verified this

  • Quote Investigator found no substantive evidence tying the line to C.S. Lewis; its earliest match is Les Brown’s 1992 book Live Your Dreams.
  • Lewis specialist William O’Flaherty of the Essential C.S. Lewis project concluded the Lewis attribution is incorrect and that Les Brown was the likely creator.
  • A Check Your Fact review rated the Lewis attribution false, noting it does not appear in The Quotable Lewis or his published works and citing Lewis scholar Michael Ward.
  • By 1998 the line was reprinted in the Chicken Soup for the Soul series and in Daily Riches — both crediting Les Brown, not Lewis, per Quote Investigator.
In copyright

The earliest documented source is Les Brown’s Live Your Dreams, first published in 1992 by William Morrow & Company — well after 1931, so the wording is in copyright to Brown and his publisher. It is not a public-domain Lewis line, because it is not a Lewis line at all.

Fact-check

How it got pinned on Lewis

This is a classic feel-good misattribution: an uplifting, quotable line drifts onto a beloved literary name that lends it authority. C.S. Lewis is one of the internet’s biggest magnets for such quotes.

C.S. Lewis No source

The line appears in none of Lewis’s books, essays, or letters, and is absent from The Quotable Lewis. Quote Investigator found no substantive evidence connecting it to him.

Les Brown Documented 1992

The earliest documented appearance is Brown’s 1992 book Live Your Dreams; by 1998 it circulated in the Chicken Soup series, still credited to Brown, per Quote Investigator.

No evidence ties this line to C.S. Lewis; the earliest documented source is motivational speaker Les Brown’s 1992 book Live Your Dreams, per Quote Investigator.

Context

Why it matters

The sentiment is old — Quote Investigator notes thematic cousins going back to Adelaide Anne Procter’s 1859 verse and the 1881 line “It is never too late to be what you might have been.” But the specific modern wording here belongs to the self-help era, not to Oxford’s mid-century Christian apologist.

Attaching it to C.S. Lewis borrows a literary halo the phrase never earned. The honest credit — a 1990s motivational speaker — is no less inspiring, just accurate.

An uplifting line drifts onto a famous name that lends it borrowed authority.

Explore

Filed under

More provenance-checked quotes on the same theme, each with its reuse status.

Hope Growth

Go further

Dig deeper

Trusted places to keep pulling the thread — primary archives, fact-checks, and scholarship. We show how we used each one before you leave.

Quote Investigator: full investigationquoteinvestigator.com

Traces the earliest attestation to Les Brown's 1992 Live Your Dreams and finds no Lewis link.
Check Your Fact: rated falsecheckyourfact.com

Fact-check citing Lewis scholar Michael Ward and The Quotable Lewis.
Essential C.S. Lewis: misquotesessentialcslewis.com

William O'Flaherty's Misquote Mondays entry debunking the Lewis attribution of this line.
Les Brown (speaker)en.wikipedia.org

Background on the motivational speaker credited as the likely originator.
C.S. Lewis on Wikiquoteen.wikiquote.org

Sourced and misattributed quotations attributed to Lewis.

The likely originator

Who actually wrote it

Les Brown

b. 1945 · American motivational speaker & author

Les Brown is an American motivational speaker, author, and former Ohio state legislator known for high-energy self-help seminars. The line first appears in documented form in his 1992 book Live Your Dreams, in a passage headed “Never Too Old to Be Bold.” It was later spread through the Chicken Soup for the Soul series before being mistakenly reassigned to C.S. Lewis online.

For writers & researchers

Cite this

Earliest documented source

Les Brown, Live Your Dreams (New York: William Morrow & Company, 1992), section “Never Too Old to Be Bold.” Earliest documented appearance per Quote Investigator, “You Are Never Too Old To Set Another Goal or To Dream a New Dream” (Sept. 8, 2017).

This verification page

Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘You are never too old to set another goal, or to dream a new dream’?” Last verified 8 Jul 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/you-are-never-too-old-to-set-another-goal-or-to-dream-a-new

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