Great War Quotes - Page 2

• What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans, and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy?

  Mahatma Gandhi

  Inspirational, Peace, War

  Non-Violence in Peace and War (1942) vol. 1, ch. 142

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• War is an instrument entirely inefficient toward redressing wrong; and multiplies, instead of indemnifying losses.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Peace, War, Loss

  Letter to John Sinclair, 1798.

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• Peace is not absence of conflict, it is the ability to handle conflict by peaceful means.

  Ronald Reagan

  Love, Peace, War

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• Only the dead have seen the end of the war.

  George Santayana

  Military, War, Philosophical

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• Guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism.

  George Washington

  Memorial Day, War, 4th Of July

  George Washington (1810). “Washington's Farewell Address to the People of the United States”, p.17

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• No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.

  James Madison

  Freedom, War, Democracies Have

  James Madison, Ralph Ketcham “Selected Writings of James Madison”, Hackett Publishing

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• War does not determine who is right - only who is left.

  Bertrand Russell

  Peace, Military, War

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• The art of war is simple enough. Find out where your enemy is. Get at him as soon as you can. Strike him as hard as you can, and keep moving on.

  Ulysses S. Grant

  Art, Peace, Military

  Statement to John Hill Brinton at the start of his Tennessee River Campaign, early 1862. "Personal Memoirs of John H. Brinton, Major and Surgeon U.S.V., 1861-1865". Book by John H. Brinton, p. 239, 1914.

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• Above all, we must realize that no arsenal, or no weapon in the arsenals of the world, is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women. It is a weapon our adversaries in today's world do not have.

  Ronald Reagan

  Courage, War, Patriotic

  First Inaugural Address, delivered 20 January 1981

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• When will mankind be convinced and agree to settle their difficulties by arbitration?

  Benjamin Franklin

  War, Arbitration, Compromise

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• The executive has no right, in any case, to decide the question, whether there is or is not cause for declaring war.

  James Madison

  War, Liberty, Tyranny Founding Fathers

  Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay (1852). “The Federalist, on the new constitution, written in 1788, with an appendix, containing the letters of Pacificus and Helvidius on the proclamation of neutrality of 1793, also the original articles of confederation and the constitution of the United States”, p.451

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• Conquest is not in our principles. It is inconsistent with our government.

  Thomas Jefferson

  War, Government, Principles

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• The spirit of this country is totally adverse to a large military force.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Country, Peace, Military

  Thomas Jefferson (1854). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence, contin”, p.47

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• Statism needs war; a free country does not. Statism survives by looting; a free country survives by producing.

  Ayn Rand

  Country, Peace, War

  Ayn Rand, Nathaniel Branden, Alan Greenspan, Robert Hessen (1986). “Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal”, p.35, Penguin

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• Know the enemy and know yourself.

  Sun Tzu

  Fear, Military, War

  The Art of War ch. 3 (translation by Yuan Shibang)

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• Commerce with all nations, alliance with none, should be our motto.

  Thomas Jefferson

  War, Liberty, Alliances

  Thomas Jefferson (1829). “Memoir, correspondence, and miscellanies from the papers of T. Jefferson”, p.425

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• I hope our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us, that the less we use our power the greater it will be.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Wisdom, Peace, War

  Thomas Jefferson, Jerry Holmes (2002). “Thomas Jefferson: A Chronology of His Thoughts”, p.254, Rowman & Littlefield

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• This world of ours... must avoid becoming a community of dreadful fear and hate, and be, instead, a proud confederation of mutual trust and respect.

  Dwight D. Eisenhower

  Respect, Fear, Hate

  Farewell Address, delivered 17 January 1961

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• Peace and friendship with all mankind is our wisest policy, and I wish we may be permitted to pursue it.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Inspirational, Friendship, Peace

  Thomas Jefferson (1829). “Memoir, correspondence, and miscellanies from the papers of T. Jefferson”

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• All those who seek to destroy the liberties of a democratic nation ought to know that war is the surest and shortest means to accomplish it.

  Alexis de Tocqueville

  Peace, War, Mean

  Democracy in America vol. 2, sec. 3, ch. 22 (1840) (translation by Henry Reeve)

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• You must not fight too often with one enemy, or you will teach him all your art of war.

  Napoleon Bonaparte

  Wisdom, Art, Military

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• We seek peace, knowing that peace is the climate of freedom. And now, as in no other age, we seek it because we have been warned, by the power of modern weapons, that peace may be the only climate possible for human life itself.

  Dwight D. Eisenhower

  Peace, Freedom, War

  Second Inaugural Address, en.wikisource.org. January 21, 1957.

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• The constitution vests the power of declaring war in Congress; therefore no offensive expedition of importance can be undertaken until after they shall have deliberated upon the subject and authorized such a measure.

  George Washington

  Travel, War, 4th Of July

  George Washington (1836). “The Writings of George Washington: Being His Correspondence, Addresses, Messages, and Other Papers, Official and Private, Selected and Published from the Original Manuscripts; with a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations”, p.367

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• I think that people want peace so much that one of these days government had better get out of their way and let them have it.

  Dwight D. Eisenhower

  Music, Peace, Military

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• It is my conviction that killing under the cloak of war is nothing but an act of murder.

  Albert Einstein

  Peace, War, Killing Someone

  Albert Einstein (2015). “Bite-Size Einstein: Quotations on Just About Everything from the Greatest Mind of the Twentieth Century”, p.56, St. Martin's Press

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