POMPEY: It is vain for the coward to fly; death follows close behind;
It is only by defying it that the brave escape.[POMPEE: Le lâche fuit en vain; la mort vole à sa suite:
C’est en la défiant que le brave l’évite.]Voltaire (1694-1778) French writer [pseud. of Francois-Marie Arouet]
Le Triumvirat [The Triumvirate], Act 4, sc. 7 (1763)
(Source)
Quotations about:
coward
Note not all quotations have been tagged, so Search may find additional quotes on this topic.
Any coward can fight a battle when he’s sure of winning; but give me the man who has pluck to fight when he’s sure of losing. That’s my way, sir; and there are many victories worse than a defeat.
George Eliot (1819-1880) English novelist [pseud. of Mary Ann Evans]
Scenes of Clerical Life, “Janet’s Repentance,” ch. 6 (1857)
(Source)
The fear of being laughed at makes cowards of us all.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1963)
(Source)
Even cowards can endure hardship; only the brave can endure suspense.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 3 (1963)
(Source)
CAESAR: Cowards die many times before their deaths;
The valiant never taste of death but once.
Of all the wonders that I yet have heard,
It seems to me most strange that men should fear,
Seeing that death, a necessary end,
Will come when it will come.William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
Julius Caesar, Act 2, sc. 2, l. 34ff (2.2.34-39) (1599)
(Source)
The initial phrase has seemingly morphed in the retelling, though still being cited to Shakespeare: "A coward dies a thousand times before his death, but the valiant taste of death but once." This is the form most often seen, but is not Shakespeare.
In A Farewell to Arms (1929), Hemingway gives another paraphrase: "The coward dies a thousand deaths, the brave but one." This, too, sometimes gets modified to make it scan better, e.g., "A coward dies a thousand deaths, the brave dies only once."
Choose your leaders
with wisdom and forethought.
To be led by a coward
is to be controlled
by all that the coward fears.
To be led by a fool
is to be led
by the opportunists
who control the fool.
To be led by a thief
is to offer up
your most precious treasures
to be stolen.
To be led by a liar
is to ask
to be lied to.
To be led by a tyrant
is to sell yourself
and those you love
into slavery.Octavia Butler (1947-2006) American writer
Parable of the Talents, ch. 11, epigraph (1998)
(Source)
The epigraph is cited to the in-fiction Earthseed: The Books of the Living.
HENRY: Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host,
That he which hath no stomach to this fight,
Let him depart; his passport shall be made,
And crowns for convoy put into his purse:
We would not die in that man’s company,
That fears his fellowship to die with us.William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
Henry V, Act 4, sc. 3, l. 37ff (4.3.37-42) (1599)
(Source)
A cowardly leader is the most dangerous of men.
Stephen King (b. 1947) American author
Under the Dome (2009)
The brave only know how to forgive; it is the most refined and generous pitch of virtue human nature can arrive at. Cowards have done good and kind actions, cowards have even fought, nay some times, even conquered; but a coward never forgave. It is not in his nature; the power of doing it flows only from a strength and greatness of soul, conscious of its own force and security, and above the little temptations of resenting every fruitless attempt to interrupt its happiness.
Laurence Sterne (1713-1786) Anglo-Irish novelist, Anglican clergyman
Sermon 12, “Joseph’s History Considered”
(Source)
A brave man is sometimes a desperado: a bully is always a coward.
Thomas Chandler Haliburton (1796-1865) Canadian politician, judge, humorist
Sam Slick’s Wise Saws and Modern Instances, Vol. 1 (1853)
Silence becomes cowardice when occasion demands speaking out the whole truth and acting accordingly.
Mohandas Gandhi (1869-1948) Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist, political ethicist [Mahatma Gandhi]
In Harijan (7 Apr 1946)
RICHARD: Conscience is but a word that cowards use,
Devised at first to keep the strong in awe:
Our strong arms be our conscience, swords our law.William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
Richard III, Act 5, sc. 3, l. 327ff (5.3.327-329) (1592)
(Source)
We do not go to cowards for tender dealing; there is nothing so cruel as panic; the man who has least fear for his own carcase, has most time to consider others.
Even cowards gain courage from companionship.
Homer (fl. 7th-8th C. BC) Greek author
The Iliad [Ἰλιάς], Book 13, l. 235 (13.235) (c. 750 BC) [tr. Butler (1898)]
(Source)
Poseidon, appearing as Thoas, talking with Idomeneus. Alt. trans.:
- "We find, / That virtue co-augmented thrives in men of little mind." [tr. Chapman (1611), ll. 218-19]
- "Not vain the weakest, if their force unite." [tr. Pope (1715-20)]
- "Union much / Emboldens even the weakest." [tr. Cowper (1791), ll. 292-93]
- "For useful is the valour of men, even the very pusillanimous, if combined." [tr. Buckley (1860)]
- "E’en meaner men, united, courage gain." [tr. Derby (1864)]
- "Ay, and very cowards get courage from company." [tr. Leaf/Lang/Myers (1891)]
- "Prowess comes from fellowship even of right sorry folk." [tr. Murray (1924)]
- "Even the poorest fighters turn into brave men when they stand side by side." [tr. Rieu (1950)]
- "The worst cowards, banded together, have their power." [tr. Fagles (1990), l. 281]
Fortune is not on the side of the faint-hearted.
Sophocles (496-406 BC) Greek tragic playwright
Phaedra, fragment 842
Also "Fortune never helps the fainthearted" [Fragments, l. 666]
To sin by silence, when we should protest,
Makes cowards out of men.
