courage & fear15 quotes

“I do not and will not fear tomorrow because I feel as though today has been enough.”

“Pretend you are an atheist in the Middle Ages. How would you have managed? You could have kept quiet and pretended to go along with the dominant beliefs, you could have expressed your disagreements and doubts in code or obliquely through art, or you could have spoken up and challenged the consensus and demanded recognition of your minority views.

Those are still your options. Most likely you will not be strung up by your testicles or impaled or crucified or burned at the stake or have molten lead poured down your throat or have your fingertips smashed. You probably will not be buried up to your neck in the hot desert sand with your eyelids cut off so the sun cooks your eyeballs and you probably will not have your head slathered in honey so ants and flies eat your face.”

“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 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.”

“A barbarian awareness of true danger can be an asset to any society, as well as a barbarian willingness to believe that straight action, not interminable moral confusion, is sometimes required.”

“I gotta take a stand...I am not gonna sit on my ass as the events that affect me unfold to determine the course of my life. I’m gonna take a stand.”

“The high-agency mindset about rejection takes things even further. It says that you should seek out rejection, or at least welcome it.

Congratulate yourself on hearing no. Remind yourself that if you don’t routinely encounter rejection, you are not asking for enough-you’re only making requests that are extremely likely to receive a yes. By making bolder requests, you will sometimes achieve big leaps, and you’ll know you’re not leaving opportunities on the table.”

“Fortunately I have never learned to take the good advice I give myself nor the counsel of my fears.”

“And, so strange as it may sound, I learned from this very four year’s schooling in force and in all the fantastic extravagance of material warfare, that life has no depth of meaning except when it is pledged for an ideal, and that there are ideals in comparison with which the life of an individual and even of a people has no weight. And though the aim for which I fought as an individual, as an atom in the whole body of the army, was not to be achieved, though material force cast us, apparently, to the Earth, yet we learned once and for all to stand for a cause and if necessary to fall as befitted men.”

“However cleverly people may talk and write, there is nothing to set against self-sacrifice that is not pale, insipid, and miserable.”

“The great moment had come. The fire lifted over the first trenches. We advanced…

The turmoil of our feelings was called forth by rage, alcohol, and the thirst for blood as we stepped out, heavily yet irresistibly, for the enemy’s lines. And therewith beat the pulse of heroism—the godlike and the bestial inextricably mingled. I was far in front of the company, followed by my batman, and a man of one year’s service called Haake. In my right hand I gripped my revolver, in my left a bamboo riding-cane. I was boiling with a fury now utterly inconceivable to me. The overpowering desire to kill winged my feet. Rage squeezed bitter tears from my eyes.”

“Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative and creation there is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself then providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issue from the decision, raising in one’s favour all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamed would have come his way. Whatever you can do or dream you can begin it, boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Begin it now.”

“Audentes Fortuna juvat.

Fortune favours the bold.”

“Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in that grey twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.”

“And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” Then I said, “Here I am! Send me.”

Oὐ γὰρ ἔδωκεν ἡμῖν ὁ θεὸς πνεῦμα δειλίας, ἀλλὰ δυνάμεως καὶ ἀγάπης καὶ σωφρονισμοῦ.

“For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and love and self-discipline.”