Otis A > Otis's Quotes

“Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened.”
― Winston S. Churchill

“If you are going through hell, keep going.”
― Winston S. Churchill

“Tact is the ability to tell someone to go to hell in such a way that they look forward to the trip.”
― Winston Churchill

“History will be kind to me for I intend to write it.”
― Winston S. Churchill

“My tastes are simple: I am easily satisfied with the best.”
― Winston S. Churchill

“You have enemies? Good. That means you've stood up for something, sometime in your life.”
― Winston Churchill

“Never, never, never give in!”
― Winston S. Churchill

“Success is stumbling from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.”
― Winston S. Churchill

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

“Don't interrupt me while I'm interrupting.”
― Winston S. Churchill

“Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.”
― Winston Churchill, Never Give In! The Best of Winston Churchill's Speeches

“Kites rise highest against the wind, not with it.”
― Winston S. Churchill

“I pass with relief from the tossing sea of Cause and Theory to the firm ground of Result and Fact.”
― Winston Churchill, The Story of the Malakand Field Force

“How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries. Improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live. A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity. The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property – either as a child, a wife, or a concubine – must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men. Thousands become the brave and loyal soldiers of the faith: all know how to die but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it had vainly struggled, the civilisation of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilisation of ancient Rome.”
― Winston Churchill, The River War

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

“If you cannot read all your books...fondle them---peer into them, let them fall open where they will, read from the first sentence that arrests the eye, set them back on the shelves with your own hands, arrange them on your own plan so that you at least know where they are. Let them be your friends; let them, at any rate, be your acquaintances.”
― Winston S. Churchill

“We are masters of the unsaid words, but slaves of those we let slip out.”
― Winston S. Churchill

“When the eagles are silent, the parrots begin to jabber.”
― Winston S. Churchill

“Everyone is in favor of free speech. Hardly a day passes without its being extolled, but some people's idea of it is that they are free to say what they like, but if anyone else says anything back, that is an outrage.”
― Winston Churchill

“...But the Mahommedan religion increases, instead of lessening, the fury of intolerance. It was originally propagated by the sword, and ever since, its votaries have been subject, above the people of all other creeds, to this form of madness. In a moment the fruits of patient toil, the prospects of material prosperity, the fear of death itself, are flung aside. The more emotional Pathans are powerless to resist. All rational considerations are forgotten. Seizing their weapons, they become Ghazis—as dangerous and as sensible as mad dogs: fit only to be treated as such. While the more generous spirits among the tribesmen become convulsed in an ecstasy of religious bloodthirstiness, poorer and more material souls derive additional impulses from the influence of others, the hopes of plunder and the joy of fighting. Thus whole nations are roused to arms. Thus the Turks repel their enemies, the Arabs of the Soudan break the British squares, and the rising on the Indian frontier spreads far and wide. In each case civilisation is confronted with militant Mahommedanism. The forces of progress clash with those of reaction. The religion of blood and war is face to face with that of peace.”
― Winston Churchill, The Story of the Malakand Field Force

“Before you can inspire with emotion, you must be swamped with it yourself. Before you can move their tears, your own must flow. To convince them, you must yourself, believe.”
― Winston Churchill

“The farther backward you can look, the farther forward you are likely to see.”
― Winston S. Churchill

“In the course of my life, I have often had to eat my words, and I must confess that I have always found it a wholesome diet.”
― Winston Spencer-Churchill

“History is written by the victors.”
― Walter Benjamin

“It is a good thing for an uneducated man to read books of quotations.”
― Winston S. Churchill

“When you get a thing the way you want it, leave it alone.”
― Winston Churchill

“A love for tradition has never weakened a nation, indeed it has strengthened nations in their hour of peril. ”
― Winston S. Churchill

“The truth is incontrovertible. Malice may attack it, ignorance may deride it, but in the end, there it is.”
― Winston S. Churchill

“We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender, and even if, which I do not for a moment believe, this Island or a large part of it were subjugated and starving, then our Empire beyond the seas, armed and guarded by the British Fleet, would carry on the struggle, until, in God's good time, the New World, with all its power and might, steps forth to the rescue and the liberation of the old.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The Second World War: Alone

“A small lie needs a bodyguard of bigger lies to protect it.”
― Winston S. Churchill