Great Throughts Treasury

"I sometimes marvel at the extra-ordinary docility with which Americans submit to speeches."

"I then had one of the three or four long intimate conversations with him which are all I can boast."

"I think "No comment" is a splendid expression. I am using it again and again. I got it from Sumner Welles. To reporters at the Washington airport, after conferring with President Truman at the White House, February 12, 1946"

"I think a curse should rest on me ? because I love this war. I know it's smashing and shattering the lives of thousands every moment ? and yet ? I can't help it ? I enjoy every second of it."

"I think it is the most important subject facing this country, but I cannot get any of my ministers to take any notice."

"I think 'No Comment' is a splendid expression. I am using it again and again."

"I should have liked to be asked to say what I knew. They always tried to ask what I did not know. When I would have willingly displayed my knowledge, they sought to expose my ignorance. This sort of treatment had only one result: I did not do well in examinations"

"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."

"I told my doctor I got all the exercise I needed being a pallbearer for all my friends who run and do exercises!"

"I was never tired of listening to his wisdom or imparting my own."

"I thought of a remark . . . that the United States is like a 'gigantic boiler. Once the fire is lighted under it there is no limit to the power it can generate.' Being saturated and satiated with emotion and sensation, I went to bed and slept the sleep of the saved and thankful."

"I was only the servant of my country and had I, at any moment, failed to express her unflinching resolve to fight and conquer, I should at once have been rightly cast aside."

"I was not the lion, but it fell to me to give the lion?s roar."

"I was very glad that Mr. Attlee described my speeches in the war as expressing the will not only of Parliament but of the whole nation. Their will was resolute and remorseless and, as it proved, unconquerable. It fell to me to express it, and if I found the right words you must remember that I have always earned my living by my pen and by my tongue. It was a nation and race dwelling all-round the globe that had the lion heart. I had the luck to be called upon to give the roar."

"I wanted us to go to the Tories when we were strong...not in misfortune to be made an honest woman of."

"I want no criticism of America at my table. The Americans criticize themselves more than enough."

"I was myself so smitten in public opinion that it was the almost universal view that my political life was at last ended."

"I will begin by saying what everybody would like to ignore or forget but which must nevertheless be stated, namely that we have sustained a total and unmitigated defeat, and France has suffered even more than we have... the German dictator, instead of snatching the victuals from the table, has been content to have them served to him course by course."

"I wish Stanley Baldwin no ill, but it would have been much better if he had never lived."

"I will not pretend that if I had to choose between communism and Nazism I would choose communism."

"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. We have before us an ordeal of the most grievous kind. We have before us many, many long months of struggle and of suffering. You ask, what is our policy? I will say: It is to wage war, by sea, land and air, with all our might and with all the strength that God can give us; to wage war against a monstrous tyranny, never surpassed in the dark, lamentable catalogue of human crime. That is our policy. You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word: Victory -- 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."

"I wonder whether any other generation has seen such astounding revolutions of data and values as those through which we have lived. Scarcely anything material or established which I was brought up to believe was permanent and vital, has lasted. Everything I was sure or taught to be sure was impossible, has happened."

"I yield to no one in my detestation of Bolshevism, and of the revolutionary violence which precedes it... But my hatred of Bolshevism and Bolsheviks is not founded on their silly system of economics, or their absurd doctrine of an impossible equality. It arises from the bloody and devastating terrorism which they practice in every land into which they have broken, and by which alone their criminal regime can be maintained... Governments who have seized upon power by violence and by usurpation have often resorted to terrorism in their desperate efforts to keep what they have stolen, but the august and venerable structure of the British Empire ? does not need such aid. Such ideas are absolutely foreign to the British way of doing things."

"If Hitler invaded hell I would make at least a favorable reference to the devil in the House of Commons."

"If I had been an Italian I am sure that I should have been whole-heartedly with you from the start to finish in your triumphant struggle against the bestial appetites and passions of Leninism."

"If he trips he must be sustained. If he makes mistakes they must be covered. If he sleeps he must not be wantonly disturbed. If he is no good he must be pole-axed"

"If I had been an Italian, I am sure I would have been entirely with you from the beginning to the end of your victorious struggle against the bestial appetites and passions of Leninism."

"If I was your wife Sir, I'd poison you! Madam, if you were my wife, I'd let you!"

"If one has to submit, it is wasteful not to do so with the best grace possible"

"If I were the first of May, I should be ashamed of myself."

"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."

"If the Almighty were to rebuild the world and asked me for advice, I would have English Channels round every country. And the atmosphere would be such that anything which attempted to fly would be set on fire."

"If we could get out of this jam by giving up Malta and Gibraltar and some African colonies I would jump at it. But the only safe way is to convince Hitler that he cannot beat us."

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

"If the present tries to sit in judgment of the past it will lose the future."

"If we can stand up to Hitler, all Europe may be free and the life of the world may move forward into broad, sunlit uplands."

"If we win, nobody will care. If we lose, there will be nobody to care."

"If we open a quarrel between the past and the present, we shall find we have lost the future."

"If you are going through hell, keep going."

"If we don't end war, war will end us."

"If you are going to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite."

"If you cannot read all your books, at any rate handle, or as it were, fondle them ? peer into them, let them fall open where they will, read from the first sentence that arrests the eye, set them back on the shelves with your own hands, arrange them on your own plan so that if you do not know what is in them, you at least know where they are. Let them be your friends; let them at any rate be your acquaintances. If they cannot enter the circle of your life, do not deny them at least a nod of recognition."

"If you destroy a free market, you create a black market."

"If you find yourself going thru Hell, keep going."

"If you have knowledge, let others light their candles with it."

"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."

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

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

"If you have 10,000 regulations, you destroy all respect for the law."

"If you mean to profit, learn to please."