"First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out—
because I was not a communist;
Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—
because I was not a socialist;
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—
because I was not a trade unionist;
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
because I was not a Jew;
Then they came for me—
and there was no one left to speak out for me."
— Martin Niemöller

"Conscience and cowardice are really the same things, Basil. Conscience is the trade-name of the firm. That is all."
— Oscar Wilde (The Picture of Dorian Gray)

"I'm astounded whenever I finish something. Astounded and distressed. My perfectionist instinct should inhibit me from finishing: it should inhibit me from even beginning. But I get distracted and start doing something. What I achieve is not the product of an act of my will but of my will's surrender. I begin because I don't have the strength to think; I finish because I don't have the courage to quit. This book is my cowardice."
— Fernando Pessoa

"In self-defense and in defense of the innocent, cowardice is the only sin."
— Dean Koontz

"A team is where a boy can prove his courage on his own. A gang is where a coward goes to hide."
— Mickey Mantle

"Some have been thought brave because they were afraid to run away."
— Thomas Fuller

"It is better by noble boldness to run the risk of being subject to half of the evils we anticipate than to remain in cowardly listlessness for fear of what might happen."
— Herodotus (The Histories)

"I think before I act---and then think again. I am not entirely a coward, but I do not lose myself in action as you do."
— John Christopher (Beyond the Burning Lands)

"You and I both know, deep in your heart, you agree with me. And I will prove it with one hypothetical scenario: you are alone in a closet of your home. There`s a bright red button. You can push that button and presto all Negroes and Jews and all other colored people are instantly removed from the North American continent and returned to their native countries.
You`d push it, wouldn`t you whitey?
See? See? See? in the final analysis, you agree with me.
But of course, you wouldn`t do antything to bring that scenario about, or any other scenario favorable to your Race.
"
— Frazier Glenn Miller (A White Man Speaks Out)

"Idiot. Which road do you take when you're running from something weaker than yourself? Or maybe you're the one looking for an excuse to back out.
-Sano to Raijuuta"
— Watsuki Nobuhiro

"If you go to your death rather than do everything you might to prevent what is happening, you are merely committing suicide and trying to make yourself feel better about it. That is the act of a coward. It is beneath contempt."
— Jim Butcher (Dead Beat)

"The acknowledgement of White cowardice has driven literally tens of millions of White Americans to try to escape it by undergoing a voluntary human metamorphosis and becoming "part-Indian." 95% would become proven liars by a simple DNA test, but their children grow up believing the lie. Abandoning the White race means not having to fight for it or defend it in any way. "
— Frazier Glenn Miller

"When the sands are all dry, he is gay as a lark,
And will talk in contemptuous tones of the Shark:
But, when the tide rises and sharks are around,
His voice has a timid and tremulous sound."
— Lewis Carroll (Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass)

"Naphta loathed the bourgeois state and its love of security. He found occasion to express this loathing one autumn afternoon when, as they were walking along the main street, it suddenly began to rain and, as if on command, there was an umbrella over every head. That was a symbol of cowardice and vulgar effeminacy, the end product of civilization. An incident like the sinking of the Titanic was atavistic, true, but its effect was most refreshing, it was the handwriting on the wall. Afterward, of course, came the hue and cry for more security in shipping. How pitiful, but such weak-willed humanitarianism squared very nicely with the wolfish cruelty and villainy of slaughter on the economic battlefield known as the bourgeois state. War, war ! He was all for it – the universal lust or war seemed quite honorable in comparison."
— Thomas Mann (The Magic Mountain)

"We have made men proud of most vices, but not of cowardice. Whenever we have almost succeeded in doing so, God permits a war or an earthquake or some other calamity, and at once courage becomes so obviously lovely and important even in human eyes that all our work is undone, and there is still at least one vice of which they feel genuine shame. The danger of inducing cowardice in our patients, therefore, is lest we produce real self-knowledge and self-loathing, with consequent repentance and humility."
— C.S. Lewis (The Screwtape Letters)

"He had carefully avoided her out of the natural cowardice that characterizes the stronger sex."
— Gustave Flaubert (Madame Bovary)