Winston Churchill

As far as I can see you have used every cliche except 'God is love' and 'Please adjust your dress before leaving'.

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.

There is no doubt that it is around the family and the home that all the greatest virtues the most dominating virtues of human society are created strengthened and maintained

I do not wonder that British youth is in revolt against the morbid doctrine that nothing matters but the equal sharing of miseries, that what used to be called the submerged tenth can only be rescued by bringing the other nine-tenths down to their le

If this is a blessing it is certainly very well disguised.

The length of this document defends it well against the risk of its being read.

In Franklin Roosevelt there died the greatest American friend we have ever known and the greatest champion of freedom who has ever brought help and comfort from the New World to the Old.

Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference.

If the human race wishes to have a prolonged and indefinite period of material prosperity they have only got to behave in a peaceful and helpful way toward one another

In wartime truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies.

It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried.

Jellicoe was the only man on either side who could lose the war in an afternoon.

During my life I have often had to eat my own words and on the whole I have found them a wholesome diet

The Prime Minister has nothing to hide from the President of the United States (Stepping from his bath in presence of President Roosevelt).

If you're not a liberal at twenty you have no heart if you're not a conservative at forty you have no brain.

Nothing recalls the past so potently as a smell.

One ought never to turn one's back on a threatened danger and try to run away from it. If you do that you will double the danger. But if you meet it promptly and without flinching you will reduce the danger by half. Never run away from anything. Never!

It was the nation and the race dwelling all round the globe that had the lion's heart. I had the luck to be called upon to give the roar.

The farther backward you can look the farther forward you are likely to see.

You can always count on Americans to do the right thing - after they've tried everything else.

Beware the sleeping dragon. For when she awakes the Earth will shake [On China].

If we open a quarrel between the past and the present we shall find that we have lost the future

(Prime Minister Joseph) Chamberlain loves the working man - he loves to see him work

I have taken more good from alcohol than alcohol has taken from me.

The Arabs are a backwards people who eat nothing but Camel dung

The farther backward you can look the farther forward you can see

What is a fine person or a beauteous face Unless deportment give them decent grace, Blessed with all other requisites to please To want the striking elegance of ease, Awkward embarrassed stiff without the skill Of moving gracefully or standing

Baldwin thought Europe was a bore and Chamberlain thought it was only a greater Birmingham.

I am bored with it all.

My hand seemed arrested by a silent veto.

I am always ready to learn but I do not always like being taught.

Opening amenities are often opening inanities.

I am not sure I should have dared to start, but I am sure that I should not have dared to stop.

It is no use saying 'We are doing our best.' You have got to succeed in doing what is necessary.

Logic is a poor guide compared with custom.

We must just KBO ('Keep Buggering On').

'You are drunk, Sir Winston, you are disgustingly drunk.' - Yes, Mrs. Braddock, I am drunk. But you, Mrs. Braddock, are ugly and disgustingly fat. But tomorrow morning, I, Winston Churchill, will be sober.

Nothing will bring American sympathy along with us so much as American blood shed in the field

A politician needs the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow next week next month and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn't happen.

When I look back on all these worries, I remember the story of the old man who said on his deathbed that he had a lot of trouble in his life, most of which never happened.

[Critics of the reforms are unlikely to be assuaged and they will raise many of their concerns again when the reform bill returns to the Commons in October before heading to the Lords. Its architects might do well to reflect on another quote from one of Woodrow Wilson's contemporaries.] There's nothing wrong with change ... if it's in the right direction.

It would be a great reform in politics if wisdom could be made to spread as easily and rapidly as folly.

Socialism is like a dream. Sooner or later you wake up to reality.

Eating words has never given me indigestion.

To meet Roosevelt with all his buoyant sparkle his iridescence was like opening a bottle of champagne.

We have always found the Irish a bit odd. They refuse to be English.

He said he was like a crocodile. You never knew whether he was trying to smile or preparing to swallow you up.

This is the sort of pedantry up with which I will not put

The farther back you can look the farther forward you are likely to see.

Don't talk to me about Naval tradition! It's nothing but rum sodomy and the lash

I am never going to have anything more to do with politics or politicians. When this war is over I shall confine myself entirely to writing and painting.

I shall always be glad to have seen it-for the same reason Papa gave for being glad to have seen Lisbon-namely "that it will be unnecessary ever to see it again."

An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile - hoping it will eat him last

Without a measureless and perpetual uncertainty the drama of human life would be destroyed

The biggest mistake that leaders can make is to give people false hope that melts like snow.

The substance of the eminent Socialist gentleman's speech is that making a profit is a sin but it is my belief that the real sin is taking a loss

Broadly speaking human beings may be divided into three classes: those who are billed to death those who are worried to death and those who are bored to death

I always avoid prophesying beforehand because it is a much better policy to prophesy after the event has already taken place.

There is something about the outside of a horse that is good for the inside of a man.

We must beware of needless innovations especially when guided by logic.

We must build a kind of United States of Europe.

When you have to kill a man it costs nothing to be polite.

It is not alone that property in all its forms is struck at but that liberty in all its forms is challenged by the fundamental conceptions of Socialism

In time of war when truth is so precious it must be attended by a bodyguard of lies

Man will occasionally stumble over the truth but most times he will pick himself up and carry on.

You must look at the facts because they look at you

We have sustained a defeat without a war.

Success is going from failure to failure without the loss of enthusiasm.

The Navy can lose us the war, but only the Air Force can win it. The fighters are our salvation, but the bombers alone provide the means of victory.

Courage is the first of human qualities because it is the quality which guarantees the others.

For good or for ill, air mastery is today the supreme expression of military power, and fleets and armies, however vital and important, must accept a subordinate rank.

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 honor and good sense

The problems of victory are more agreeable than the problems of defeat but they are no less difficult.

Sure I am this day we are masters of our fate that the task which has been set before us is not above our strength, that its pangs and toils are not beyond our endurance. As long as we have faith in our own cause and an unconquerable will to win victory will not be denied us.

We have a lot of anxieties and one cancels out another very often.

Although prepared for martyrdom I preferred that it be postponed.

Each beat guides me in Your direction.

India is a geographical term. It is no more a united nation than the Equator.

Never hold discussions with the monkey when the organ grinder is in the room.

We are masters of the unsaid words but slaves of those we let slip out

Neville Chamberlain looked at foreign affairs through the wrong end of a municipal drainpipe

There's something about the outside of a horse that's good for the inside of a man

Lady Nancy Astor: Winston if you were my husband I'd poison your tea. Churchill: Nancy if I were your husband I'd drink it.

Responsibility is the price of greatness.

I was not the lion but it fell to me to give the lion's roar.

A sheep in sheep's clothing

Some people regard private enterprise as a predatory tiger to be shot. Others look on it as a cow they can milk. Not enough people see it as a healthy horse pulling a sturdy wagon.

Soviet Union foreign policy is a puzzle inside a riddle wrapped in an enigma and the key is Russian nationalism.

Civilization will not last freedom will not survive peace will not be kept unless a very large majority of mankind unite together to defend them and show themselves possessed of a constabulary power before which barbaric and atavistic forces will

My rule of life prescribed as an absolutely sacred rite smoking cigars and also the drinking of alcohol before after and if need be during all meals and in the intervals between them.

[And a pamphlet called] Pick me up ... There is no genuine hatred against Herr Hitler.

Before Alamein we never had a victory. After Alamein we never had a defeat.

There is nothing wrong with change if it is in the right direction

Study history study history. In history lies all the secrets of statecraft.

There was unanimous automatic unquestioned agreement around our table.

I never worry about action but only about inaction

It would not have been possible for any man in public life to get through what I have gone through without the devoted assistance of what we in England call one's better half.

Anyone can rat but it takes a certain amount of ingenuity to re-rat

From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the Continent.

Perhaps it is better to be irresponsible and right than to be responsible and wrong.

Broadly speaking the short words are the best and the old words best of all.

The human story does not always unfold like a mathematical calculation on the principle that two and two make four. Sometimes in life they make five or minus three, and sometimes the blackboard topples down in the middle of the sum and leaves the class in disorder and the pedagogue with a black eye.

I always seem to get inspiration and renewed vitality by contact with this great novel land of yours which sticks up out of the Atlantic.

One day President Roosevelt told me that he was asking publicly for suggestions about what the war should be called. I said at once 'The Unnecessary War'.

Remember gentlemen it's not just France we are fighting for its Champagne!

War is a catalouge of blunders.

A man is about as big as the things that make him angry

Headmasters have powers at their disposal with which Prime Ministers have never yet been invested

'Mr. Churchill if you were my husband I'd poison your tea!' - And if you were my wife I would drink it!

Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.

I have never seen a human being who more perfectly represented the modern conception of a robot.

However beautiful the strategy you should occasionally look at the results.

Nothing can be more abhorrent to democracy than to imprison a person or keep him in prison because he is unpopular. This is really the test of civilization.

All men make mistakes but only wise men learn from their mistakes.

The rule which forbids ending a sentence with a preposition is the kind of nonsense up with which I will not put.

A medal glitters but it also casts a shadow

By being so long in the lowest form I gained an immense advantage over the cleverest boys . . . I got into my bones the essential structure of the normal British sentence - which is a noble thing.

We must have a better word than 'prefabricated'. Why not 'ready-made'?

Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duty and so bear ourselves that if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years men will still say "This was their finest hour

It's quite simple (public speaking) Say what you have to say, and when you come to a sentence with a grammatical ending, sit down.

The nation will find it very hard to look up to the leaders who are keeping their ears to the ground

Great and good are seldom the same man.

There is no finer investment for any community than putting milk into babies.

At every crisis the Kaiser crumpled. In defeat he fled, in revolution he abdicated, in exile he remarried.

I have taken more out of alcohol than alcohol has taken out of me.

When the war of the giants is over the wars of the pygmies will begin.

There is no such thing as public opinion. There is only published opinion.

Short words are best and the old words when short are best of all.

We shall draw from the heart of suffering itself the means of inspiration and survival.

If you must kill a man it costs you nothing to be polite about it.

Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak, courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.

Why you may take the most gallant sailor the most intrepid airman or the most audacious soldier put them at a table together - what do you get? The sum of their fears

The first quality that is needed is audacity.

War is a game that is played with a smile. If you can't smile grin. If you can't grin keep out of the way till you can.

To improve is to change. To be perfect is to have changed alot.

To jaw-jaw- is always better than to war-war

Without tradition art is a flock of sheep without a shepherd. Without innovation it is a corpse.

Death came very easily to her. She had lived such an innocent and loving life of service to others and held such a simple faith that she had no fears at all and did not seem to mind very much.

The Russians will try all the rooms in a house enter those that are not locked and when they come to one that cannot be broken into they will withdraw and invite you to dine genially that same evening.

Never never never never give up.

We shape our buildings, thereafter they shape us.

It becomes still more difficult to reconcile Japanese action with prudence or even sanity. What kind of people do they think we are?

Never give in except to convictions of honor and good sense. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.

Nothing would induce me to vote for giving women the franchise. I am not going to be henpecked into a question of such importance.

Politics are very much like war. We may even have to use poison gas at times.

Democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.

When a nation has allowed itself to fall under a tyrannical regime it cannot be absolved from the faults due to the guilt of that regime.

Out of intense complexities intense simplicities emerge.

The shadow of victory is disillusion

Do not let spacious plans for a new world divert your energies from saving what is left of the old.

Let our advance worrying become advance thinking and planning

Mr. Gladstone read Homer for fun which I thought served him right.

Men occasionally stumble over the truth but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened.

Sure I am of this that you have only to endure to conquer. You have only to persevere to save yourselves.

Always remember that I have taken more out of alcohol than alcohol has taken out of me.

Don

Tell them from me they are unloading history.

I am easily satisfied with the very best.

To build may have to be the slow and laborious task of years. To destroy can be the thoughtless act of a single day.

This is no time for ease and comfort. It is time to dare and endure.

I have never developed indigestion from eating my words.

He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire.

If you have ten thousand regulations you destroy all respect for the law.

Those who can win a war well can rarely make a good peace and those who could make a good peace would never have won the war.

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

It is better to be making the news than taking it, to be an actor rather than a critic

You may try to destroy all the wealth and find that all you have done is increase poverty.

My wife and I tried two or three times in the last 40 years to have breakfast together but it was so disagreeable we had to stop.

Success is never final.

The British nation is unique in this respect. They are the only people who like to be told how bad things are who like to be told the worst.

Difficulties mastered are opportunities won

The problems of victory are more agreeable than those of defeat but they are no less difficult.

When I am abroad I always make it a rule to never criticize or attack the government of my own country. I make up for lost time when I come home.

When the eagles are silent the parrots begin to jabber.

The monarchy is so extraordinarily useful. When Britain wins a battle she shouts "God save the Queen", when she loses she votes down the prime minister.

There are a terrible lot of lies going about the world and the worst of it is that half of them are true.

I would say to the House as I said to those who have joined this Government `I have nothing to offer but blood toil tears and sweat.'

It is always wise to look ahead but difficult to look further than you can see.

No comment is a splendid expression. I am using it again and again.

A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject.

No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism

[Playing golf is] like chasing a quinine pill around a cow pasture.

Thus be every device from the stick to the carrot the emaciated Austrian donkey is made to pull the Nazi barrow up an ever-steepening hill

Politics is not a game. It is an earnest business.

Christopher Columbus was the first socialist: he didn

The empires of the future are the empires of the mind.

The Balkans produce more history than they can consume

Experts should be on tap but never on top.

History will be kind to me for I intend to write it

No two on earth in all things can agree. All have some daring singularity.

Dictators ride to and fro upon tigers which they dare not dismount. And the tigers are getting hungry.

Well the principle seems the same. The water still keeps falling over.

Everyone has his day and some days last longer than others.

The truth is incontrovertible malice may attack it ignorance may deride it but in the end, there it is.

If you go on with this nuclear arms race all you are going to do is make the rubble bounce.

It is important when you haven't got any ammunition to have a butt on your rifle.

In war resolution, in defeat defiance, in victory magnanimity

[Lady Nancy Astor:] Winston if you were my husband I'd put poison in your coffee. ... Nancy if you were my wife I'd drink it.

We must beware of needless innovation especially when guided by logic.

The only guide to man is his conscience, the only shield to his memory is the rectitude and sincerity of his actions. It is very imprudent to walk through life without this shield because we are so often mocked by the failure of our hopes and the upsetting of our calculations, but with this shield however the fates may play we march always in the ranks of honor.