John > John's Quotes

“When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle.”
― Edmund Burke, Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents

“Freedom is the sure possession of those alone who have the courage to defend it.”
― Pericles

“Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfils the same function as pain in the human body; it calls attention to the development of an unhealthy state of things. If it is heeded in time, danger may be averted; if it is suppressed, a fatal distemper may develop."

[New Statesman interview, 7 January 1939]”
― Winston Churchill

“A lady came up to me one day and said 'Sir! You are drunk', to which I replied 'I am drunk today madam, and tomorrow I shall be sober but you will still be ugly.”
― Winston Churchill

“An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last.”
― Winston S. Churchill

“From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered-
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now-a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.”
― William Shakespeare, Henry V

“War is an ill thing, as I surely know. But 'twould be an ill world for weaponless dreamers if evil men were not now and then slain.”
― Rudyard Kipling

“Gentlemen, this is a story that you shall tell your grandchildren, and mightily bored they'll be.”
― Lt General Brian Horrocks

“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle.”
― Plato

“Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.”
― George Orwell, 1984

“Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much.”
― Oscar Wilde

“If everybody is thinking alike, then somebody isn't thinking.”
― George S. Patton

“Better to fight for something than live for nothing.”
― George S. Patton

“The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him.”
― G.K. Chesterton

“Personally, I'm always ready to learn, although I do not always like being taught.”
― Winston S. Churchill