Allan Massie Quotes

Do you know what a soldier is, young man? He's the chap who makes it possible for civilised folk to despise war.

Allan Massie

• War
• Soldier

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Quotes to Explore

• During the Cold War, we were interested because we were scared that Russia and the United States were going to go to war. We were scared that Russia was going to take over the world. Every country became a battleground.

  

  Fareed Zakaria
  • World
  • Country
  • War

• There is a huge reservoir of support for abortion rights from ordinary women. I hear all the time from women who had abortions and say it made possible the good life they went on to have. Social shaming silences too many.

  

  Katha Pollitt
  • Life
  • Time
  • Good

• When the Lebanese Civil War started in 1975, I was 15. I was shipped to boarding school in England and, after that, to UCLA.

  

  Rabih Alameddine
  • School
  • War
  • Civil War

• Write how you want, the critic shall show the world you could have written better.

  

  Oliver Goldsmith
  • World
  • Want
  • Better

• Conscientious objection is an intrinsic part of being a soldier.

  

  Naftali Bennett
  • Being
  • Soldier
  • Intrinsic

• In war the heroes always outnumber the soldiers ten to one.

  

  H. L. Mencken
  • War
  • Heroes
  • Soldiers

• When I first met Mandela, we did not discuss anything of substance; we just felt each other out. He spent a long time expressing his admiration for the Boer generals and how ingenious they were during the Anglo-Boer war.

  

  F. W. de Klerk
  • Time
  • Long
  • War

• What I'm really worried about is war. Will the former rich countries really accept a completely changed world economy, and a shift of power away from where it has been the last 50 to 100 to 150 years, back to Asia?

  

  Hans Rosling
  • World
  • Power
  • War

• It is not only that Germany has been defeated in the war, Kaiser Wilhelm's Germany was defeated.

  

  C. L. R. James
  • War
  • Germany
  • Defeated

• Man is priest, and scholar, and statesman, and producer, and soldier.

  

  Ralph Waldo Emerson
  • Man
  • Soldier
  • Producer

• I knew it was called 'Dunkirk,' Christopher Nolan was directing it, and it was a war film. That was all anyone knew.

  

  Fionn Whitehead
  • War
  • Film
  • Knew

• You can go into Mark Twain's material and prove anything you want. He was against war. He was for war. He was against rich people and he was for them. He was a kaleidoscope.

  

  Hal Holbrook
  • People
  • War
  • Rich

• Anyone graduating from medical school in 1966 had first to fulfill military service before launching a career. Fiercely opposed to the Vietnam War, I sought to avoid it through an assignment to the Public Health Service.

  

  Harold E. Varmus
  • School
  • War
  • Career

• Here, in Cork district, you have in combination all the dangers which war can inflict.

  

  Eamon de Valera
  • War
  • Here
  • Combination

• Allow the president to invade a neighboring nation whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion,and you allow him to do so whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such purpose - and you allow him to make war at pleasure.

  

  Abraham Lincoln
  • May
  • War
  • Purpose

• I think what the Nobel committee is doing is going beyond war and looking at what humanity can do to prevent war. Sustainable management of our natural resources will promote peace.

  

  Wangari Maathai
  • War
  • Peace
  • Humanity

• All of my high school male teachers were WWII and/or Korean War veterans. They taught my brothers and me the value of service to our country and reinforced what our dad had shown us about the meaning of service.

  

  Oliver North
  • Country
  • School
  • War

• I wrote my first play when I was eight.

  

  Pam Gems
  • Play
  • First
  • Eight

• What happens in the context of war is that, in order for you to make a child into a killer, you destroy everything that they know, which is what happened to me and my town. My family was killed, all of my family, so I had nothing.

  

  Ishmael Beah
  • Family
  • War
  • Killer

• The weakness of human reason appears more evidently in those who know it not than in those who know it.

  

  Blaise Pascal
  • Know
  • Weakness
  • Human Reason

• What happens to each of my female heroes, certainly, is they find something bigger than themselves that they are honored to serve. It's not giving up your family.

  

  Tamora Pierce
  • Up
  • Family
  • Giving

• The assertion of failure coming from such persons does not mean that Mr. Mill failed to promote the practical success of those objects the advocacy of which forms the chief feature of his political writings.

  

  Millicent Fawcett
  • Writing
  • Political
  • Mean

• In my experience, professionals who are best in any field approach their work with humility. They know that their work is more than just a job. It's an exploration of life. Even on days when they feel most confident, things can go wrong. Sometimes even the good things that happen are a mystery - a surprise. There are always elements outside our control. That's humbling - or should be.

  

  Carol Ann Tomlinson
  • Sometimes
  • Humility
  • Mystery

• Do you know what a soldier is, young man? He's the chap who makes it possible for civilised folk to despise war.

  

  Allan Massie
  • War
  • Soldier