Winston Churchill Quotes

British statesman, soldier and writer (1874–1965)

Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill KG OM CH TD FRS PC (November 30, 1874 – January 24, 1965) was a British statesman who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1945, during the Second World War, and again from 1951 to 1955. Churchill was a Sandhurst-educated soldier, a Nobel Prize-winning writer and historian, a prolific painter, and one of the longest-serving politicians in British history. Apart from two years between 1922 and 1924, he was a Member of Parliament (MP) from 1900 to 1964 and represented a total of five constituencies. Ideologically an economic liberal and imperialist, he was for most of his career a member of the Conservative Party, which he led from 1940 to 1955, though he was a member of the Liberal Party from 1904 to 1924.

From: Wikiquote (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Birth Name: Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill

Also Known As: The pug • The Old Lion

Alternative Names: Winston Spencer Churchill • Charles Maurin • David Winter • The Honourable Sir Winston Spencer Churchill • Colonel Warden • Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill • Sir Leonard Spencer • Sir Winston Churchill • Sir Winston Spencer Churchill • Mr Green • The Right Honourable Sir Winston Spencer Churchill • The Right Honourable Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill • The Right Honourable Sir Winston Churchill • Churchill • Winston S. Churchill • Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill • Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill

From Wikidata (CC0)

You will make all kinds of mistakes; but as long as you are generous and true and also fierce you cannot hurt the world or even seriously distress her. She was meant to be wooed and won by youth.

Broadly speaking, the short words are the best, and the old words best of all.

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.

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

You were given the choice between war and dishonour. You chose dishonour, and you will have war.' - To Neville Chamberlain

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

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

I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma. But perhaps there is a key. That key is Russian national interest.

We shape our buildings; thereafter they shape us.

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

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

Socialism needs to pull down wealth; liberalism seeks to raise up poverty. Socialism would destroy private interests, Liberalism would preserve [them] ... by reconciling them with public right. Socialism would kill enterprise; Liberalism would rescue enterprise from the trammels of privilege and preference. Socialism assails the preeminence of the individual; Liberalism seeks ... to build up a minimum standard for the mass. Socialism exalts the rule; Liberalism exalts the man. Socialism attacks capitalism; Liberalism attacks monopoly.

Life is fraught with opportunities to keep your mouth shut.

Fear is a reaction. Courage is a decision.

Always remember, that I have taken more out of alcohol than alcohol has taken out of me.