Winston Churchill

Twice in my lifetime the long arm of destiny has reached across the oceans and involved the entire life and manhood of the United States in a deadly struggle.There was no use in saying We don’t want it; we won

Play the game for more than you can afford to lose… only then will you learn the game.

There are few virtues that the Poles do not possess and there are few errors they have ever avoided.

Still, if you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than live as slaves.

Too often the strong, silent man is silent only because he does not know what to say, and is reputed strong only because he has remained silent.

Haven’t you learned yet that I put something more than whisky into my speeches.

To regret deeply is to live afresh.

Barring that natural expression of villainy which we all have, the man looked honest enough.

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

Ah! Sir, a boy’s being flogged is not so severe as a man’s having the hiss of the world against him.

Our own life has to be our message.

The need for change bulldozed road down the center of my mind.

Beauty without grace is the hook without the bait.

I believe we are still so innocent. The species are still so innocent that a person who is apt to be murdered believes that the murderer, just before he puts the final wrench on his throat, will have enough compassion to give him one sweet cup of water.

There are many humorous things in the world; among them, the white man’s notion that he is less savage than the other savages.

Life too near paralyses art.

Sir, that all who are happy, are equally happy, is not true. A peasant and a philosopher may be equally satisfied, but not equally happy. Happiness consists in the multiplicity of agreeable consciousness.

Our thinking and our behaviour are always in anticipation of a response. It is therefore fear-based.

The superiority of some men is merely local. They are great because their associates are little.

Our best thoughts come from others.

I recall a most ingenious piece in a Wisconsin quarterly some years ago in which ‘The Recognitions’ ’ debt to ‘Ulysses’ was established in such minute detail I was doubtful of my own firm recollection of never having read ‘Ulysses.