Sometime they’ll give a war and nobody will come.
—Carl Sandburg, 1936
Archive
Quotes
I went [to war] because I couldn’t help it. I didn’t want the glory or the pay; I wanted the right thing done.
—Louisa May Alcott, 1863As peace is of all goodness, so war is an emblem, a hieroglyphic, of all misery.
—John Donne, 1622I have loved war too well.
—Louis XIV, 1715You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you.
—Leon TrotskyPolitical power grows out of the barrel of a gun.
—Mao Zedong, 1938Don’t talk to me about naval tradition. It’s nothing but rum, sodomy, and the lash.
—Winston Churchill, 1939War to the castles; peace to the cottages.
—Nicolas Chamfort, 1790You furnish the pictures, and I’ll furnish the war.
—William Randolph Hearst, 1898War is the child of pride, and pride the daughter of riches.
—Jonathan Swift, 1697A dead enemy always smells good.
—Aulus Vitellius, 69I am tired and sick of war. Its glory is all moonshine. War is hell.
—William Tecumseh Sherman, 1879I detest war. It spoils armies.
—Grand Duke Constantine of Russia, c. 1820