In this post, we’ll read Winston Churchill quotes, who was a British statesman, politician, and leader.
Winston Churchill (1874–1965) played a pivotal role in World War II and is remembered as one of the most influential figures of the 20th century.
Churchill came from a prominent political family and he enjoyed a lengthy political career as he served in the British parliament for over sixty years.
He is best known for his leadership during World War II where he delivered powerful speeches as a Prime Minister to the British people to resist the Nazis. Despite his achievement, he has been criticized for his role in British colonialism, his handling of various domestic issues, and his attitudes towards certain minority groups.
Let’s read some of the most famous Winston Churchill quotes on success, life, war and more.
Winston Churchill Quotes on Life
1. “The true guide of life is to do what is right.”
2. “We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.”
3. “A man must choose his own way of life, and…it is only by following out one’s own bent that there can be the really harmonious life.”
4. “What is the use of living, if it be not to strive for noble causes and to make this muddled world a better place for those who will live in it after we are gone?”
5. “Life is fraught with opportunities to keep your mouth shut.”
6. “I have in my life concentrated more on self-expression than self-denial.”
7. “You have enemies? Good. That means you’ve stood up for something in your life.”
8. “The greatest lesson in life is to know that even fools are right sometimes.”
9. “When I look back on all these worries, I remember the story of the old man who said on his deathbed that he had had a lot of trouble in his life, most of which had never happened.”
10. “Without a measureless and perpetual uncertainty, the drama of human life would be destroyed.”
12. “It’s not enough to have lived. We should be determined to live for something.”
13. “It is a mistake to look too far ahead. Only one link of the chain of destiny can be handled at a time.”
Winston Churchill Quotes on Success
1. “Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.”
2. “Success always demands a greater effort.”
3. “You must put your head into the lion’s mouth if the performance is to be a success.”
4. “Success is not final, failure is not fatal, it is the courage to continue that counts.”
5. “No one can guarantee success in war, but only deserve it.”
6. “It is no use saying, ‘We are doing our best.’ You have got to succeed in doing what is necessary”.
7. “Every day you may make progress. Every step may be fruitful. Yet there will stretch out before you an ever-lengthening, ever-ascending, ever-improving path. You know you will never get to the end of the journey. But this, so far from discouraging, only adds to the joy and glory of the climb.”
8. “I like things to happen, and if they don’t happen I like to make them happen.”
9. “A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.”
10. “Continuous effort—not strength or intelligence—is the key to unlocking our potential.“11. “The problems of victory are more agreeable than those of defeat, but they are no less difficult.”
Winston Churchill Quotes on Courage
1. “Fear is a reaction. Courage is a decision.”
2. “Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.”
3. “Courage is rightly esteemed the first of human qualities… because it is the quality which guarantees all others.”
4. “We have not journeyed all this way because we are made of sugar candy.”
5. “It is the time to dare and endure.”
6. “Kites rise highest against the wind – not with it.”
7. “An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last.”
8. “This is no time for ease and comfort. It is time to dare and endure.”
9. “If you’re going through hell, keep going.”
Winston Churchill Quotes on Justice
1. “It is to law alone that men owe justice and liberty. ”
2. “All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom, justice, honor, duty, mercy, hope.”
3. “One ought to be just before one is generous.”
4. “I want to be a figure for prison reform. I think that the criminal justice system is rotten.”5. “Harsh laws are at times better than no laws at all.”
6. “The truth is incontrovertible. Malice may attack it, ignorance may deride it, but in the end, there it is.”
7. “It is more agreeable to have the power to give than to receive.”
Inspirational Winston Churchill Quotes
1. “The price of greatness is responsibility.”
2. “We shape our buildings, and afterwards our buildings shape us.”
3. “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.”
4. “The farther backward you can look, the farther forward you can see.”
5. “We are masters of the unsaid words, but slaves of those we let slip out.”
6. “Do not let spacious plans for a new world divert your energies from saving what is left of the old.”
7. “If we win, nobody will care. If we lose, there will be nobody to care.”
8. “When there is no enemy within, the enemies outside cannot hurt you.”
9. “A small lie needs a bodyguard of bigger lies to protect it.”
10. “Out of intense complexities, intense simplicities emerge.”
11. “If we open a quarrel between past and present, we shall find that we have lost the future.”
12. “To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often.”
13. “Sometimes when Fortune scowls most spitefully, she is preparing her most dazzling gifts.”
Winston Churchill Quotes on War
1. “In war: resolution. In defeat: defiance. In victory: magnanimity. In peace: goodwill. ”
2. “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.”
3. “Never, never, never believe any war will be smooth and easy, or that anyone who embarks on the strange voyage can measure the tides and hurricanes he will encounter. The statesman who yields to war fever must realize that once the signal is given, he is no longer the master of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and uncontrollable events.”
4. “You were given the choice between war and dishonour. You chose dishonour, and you will have war.”
5. “War is mainly a catalogue of blunders.”
6. “When you are winning a war almost everything that happens can be claimed to be right and wise.”
7. “A prisoner of war is a man who tries to kill you and fails, and then asks you not to kill him.”
8. “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.”
9. “When the war of the giants is over the wars of the pygmies will begin.”
10. “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.”
11. “In wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies.”
12. “Battles are won by slaughter and maneuver. The greater the general, the more he contributes in maneuver, the less he demands in slaughter.”
Winston Churchill Quotes on WW2
1. “I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.”
2. “Now at this very moment I knew that the United States was in the war, up to the neck and in to the death. So we had won after all! … How long the war would last or in what fashion it would end no man could tell, nor did I at this moment care … We should not be wiped out. Our history would not come to an end … Hitler’s fate was sealed. Mussolini’s fate was sealed. As for the Japanese, they would be ground to a powder. All the rest was merely the proper application of overwhelming force.”
3. “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.”
4. “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.”
5. “We shall draw from the heart of suffering itself the means of inspiration and survival.”
Winston Churchill Quotes on History
1. “Most wars in history have been avoided simply by postponing them.”
2. “The right to guide the course of world history is the noblest prize of victory. ”
3. “For my part, I consider that it will be found much better by all Parties to leave the past to history, especially as I propose to write that history myself.”
4. “Want of foresight, unwillingness to act when action would be simple and effective, lack of clear thinking, confusion of counsel until the emergency comes, until self-preservation strikes its jarring gong—these are the features which constitute the endless repetition of history. ”
Short Winston Churchill Quotes
1. “Never, never, never give up.”
2. “I’m bored with it all.”
3. “We shall go forward together. ”
4. “I never worry about action, but only inaction.”
5. “Everyone has his day and some days last longer than others.”
6. “Difficulties mastered are opportunities won.”
7. “No crime is so great as daring to excel.”
8. “Time and money are largely interchangeable terms.”
9. “If you destroy a free market you create a black market.”
10. “When the eagles are silent, the parrots begin to jabber.”
11. “Nourish your hopes, but do not overlook realities.”
12. “I am an optimist. It does not seem too much use being anything else.”
13. “We are stripped bare by the curse of plenty.”
Winston Churchill Quotes on Education
1. “My education was interrupted only by my schooling.”
2. “The most important thing about education is appetite.”
3. “It is a good thing for an uneducated man to read books of quotations. ”
4. “The first duty of the university is to teach wisdom, not a trade; character, not technicalities. We want a lot of engineers in the modern world, but we do not want a world of engineers.”
5. “Personally I’m always ready to learn, although I do not always like being taught.”
Winston Churchill Quotes on Politics
1. “In war, you can only be killed once, but in politics, many times.”
2. “In politics when you are in doubt what to do, do nothing … when you are in doubt what to say, say what you really think.”
3. “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.”
4. “Politics are very much like war. We may even have to use poison gas at times.”
5. “Politics is not a game. It is an earnest business.”
6. “You can always count on Americans to do the right thing – after they’ve tried everything else.”
7. “Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.”
8. “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.”
9. “Healthy citizens are the greatest asset any country can have.”
Winston Churchill Quotes on Socialism & Society
1. “The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings. The inherent virtue of Socialism is the equal sharing of miseries.”
2. “Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.”
3. “A state of society where men may not speak their minds cannot long endure.”
4. “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 Quotes on Democracy
1. “The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.”
2. “It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried.”
3. “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.”
4. “When I am abroad, I always make it a rule never to criticize or attack the government of my own country. I make up for lost time when I come home.”
5. “There is no such thing as public opinion. There is only published opinion.”
6. “Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.…”
Winston Churchill Quotes on Character
1. “Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference.“
2. “Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfils the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things.“
3. “Perhaps it is better to be irresponsible and right, than to be responsible and wrong.“
4. “The power of man has grown in every sphere, except over himself.“
5. “Great and good are seldom the same man.”
6. “A man is about as big as the things that make him angry.“
7. “Solitary trees, if they grow at all, grow strong.“
8. “To build may have to be the slow and laborious task of years. To destroy can be the thoughtless act of a single day.“
9. “We shall show mercy, but we shall not ask for it.”
These Winston Churchill quotes reflect his leadership mindset as he is remembered as a symbol of courage, resilience, and defiance in the face of tyranny.
After the war, Churchill continued to be active in politics and was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1953 for his historical writings.
Which of these Winston Churchill quotes left an impact on you?
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