Selected quotes of Winston Churchill

Continuous effort - not strength or intelligence - is the key to unlocking our potential.

Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.

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

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

A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on.

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

If you're going through hell, keep going.

Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.

A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.

Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference.

Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfills the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things.

A man does what he must - in spite of personal consequences, in spite of obstacles and dangers and pressures - and that is the basis of all human morality.

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

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.

If you have an important point to make, don't try to be subtle or clever. Use a pile driver. Hit the point once. Then come back and hit it again. Then hit it a third time - a tremendous whack.


To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often.

We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.

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

Victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory however long and hard the road may be; for without victory, there is no survival.

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

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

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

The price of greatness is responsibility.

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

When you are winning a war almost everything that happens can be claimed to be right and wise.

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

Kites rise highest against the wind - not with it.

There are two things that are more difficult than making an after-dinner speech: climbing a wall which is leaning toward you and kissing a girl who is leaning away from you.

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

Difficulties mastered are opportunities won.

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

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

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

It is a mistake to look too far ahead. Only one link of the chain of destiny can be handled at a time.

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

Let our advance worrying become advance thinking and planning.

It is a fine thing to be honest, but it is also very important to be right.

Battles are won by slaughter and maneuver. The greater the general, the more he contributes in maneuver, the less he demands in slaughter.

I never worry about action, but only inaction.

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

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

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.

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.

I like a man who grins when he fights.

These are not dark days: these are great days - the greatest days our country has ever lived.

This report, by its very length, defends itself against the risk of being read.

I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.

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.

The first quality that is needed is audacity.

It is more agreeable to have the power to give than to receive.

In war as in life, it is often necessary when some cherished scheme has failed, to take up the best alternative open, and if so, it is folly not to work for it with all your might.