The River War Quotes

“How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries. Improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live. A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity. The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property – either as a child, a wife, or a concubine – must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men. Thousands become the brave and loyal soldiers of the faith: all know how to die but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it had vainly struggled, the civilisation of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilisation of ancient Rome.”
― Winston Churchill, The River War

“The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property, either as a child, a wife, or a concubine, must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men.”
― Winston Churchill, The River War

“How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries. Improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live. A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War

“The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property—either as a child, a wife, or a concubine—must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War

“Individual Moslems may show splendid qualities. Thousands become the brave and loyal soldiers of the Queen: all know how to die. But the influence of the religion paralyzes the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War

“Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science—the science against which it had vainly struggled—the civilization of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilization of ancient Rome.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War

“A wide humanitarian sympathy in a nation easily degenerates into hysteria. A military spirit tends towards brutality. Liberty leads to licence, restraint to tyranny. The pride of race is distended to blustering arrogance. The fear of God produces bigotry and superstition. There appears no exception to the mournful rule, and the best efforts of men, however glorious their early results, have dismal endings, like plants which shoot and bud and put forth beautiful flowers, and then grow rank and coarse and are withered by the winter.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“All great movements, every vigorous impulse that a community may feel, become perverted and distorted as time passes,”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“A man will perhaps tolerate an offensive word applied to himself, but will be infuriated if his nation, his rank, or his profession is insulted.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“for ambition stirs imagination nearly as much as imagination excites ambition.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“some day, in a time of shame and trouble, a second great Prophet will arise—a Mahdi who shall lead the faithful nearer God and sustain the religion.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“Solitary trees, if they grow at all, grow strong; and a boy deprived of a father's care often develops, if he escape the perils of youth, an independence and vigour of thought which may restore in after life the heavy loss of early days.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“A large proportion of the population of religious countries pass their lives at leisure, supported by the patient labour of the devout.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“There are many Christians who reverence the faith of Islam and yet regard the Mahdi merely as a commonplace religious impostor whom force of circumstances elevated to notoriety. In a certain sense, this may be true. But I know not how a genuine may be distinguished from a spurious Prophet, except by the measure of his success. The triumphs of the Mahdi were in his lifetime far greater than those of the founder of the Mohammedan faith; and the chief difference between orthodox Mohammedanism and Mahdism was that the original impulse was opposed only by decaying systems of government and society and the recent movement came in contact with a mighty civilisation and the machinery of science. Recognising this,I do not share the popular opinion, and I believe that if in future years prosperity should come to the peoples of the Upper Nile, and learning and happiness follow in its train, then the first Arab historian who shall investigate the early annals of that
new nation, will not forget, foremost among the heroes of his race, to write the name of Mohammed Ahmed .”
― Winston Churchill, The River War

“The greatest events of history are insig-
nificant beside the bill of fare. The greatest men that ever lived serve to pass an idle hour. tremendous crash of the Roman Empire is scarcely heard outside the schools and colleges. The past is insulted as much by what is remembered as by what is altogether forgotten. Yet- since the desire to live
extends beyond the span of life, and men long for a refuge in memory, when the world shall have slipped from beneath their feet like a trapdoor; since we may credit ourselves with the sympathy posterity will continue to owe ; and since some chroniclers, desiring in a distant age to write for his present a history of our past, may, rummaging among old books, find this- I have set forth in the expression of the times a true and impartial account of events which, though they will be forgotten in a century, nevertheless extended over thirteen years of strife and involved. the untimely destruction of three hundred thousand human lives.”
― Winston Churchill, The River War

“Solitary trees, if they grow at all, grow strong; and a boy deprived of a father's care often develops, if he escape the perils of youth, an independence and vigour of thought which may restore in after life the heavy loss of early days. It”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War: An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“No operation of a war is more critical than a night-march.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“I do not propose to recount the Homeric struggles of the 'friendlies.' Little in them is worthy of remembrance; much seeks oblivion.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“the continual clatter and clang of hammers and the black smoke of manufacture rose to the African sky. The malodorous incense of civilisation was offered to the startled gods of Egypt.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“Victory is the beautiful, bright-coloured flower. Transport is the stem without which it could never have blossomed. Yet even the military student, in his zeal to master the fascinating combinations of the actual conflict, often forgets the far more intricate complications of supply.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“We live in a world of 'ifs.' 'What happened,' is singular; 'what might have happened,' legion.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“The old capital is solitary and deserted. No sound of man breaks the silence of its streets. Only memory broods in the garden where the Pashas used to walk, and the courtyard where the Imperial envoy fell.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“The ugly truth is revealed that fear is the foundation of obedience.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“as the acorn is nourished by the dead leaves of the oak, the hope strengthens that the rise and fall of men and their movements are only the changing foliage of the ever-growing tree of life,”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“Few facts are so encouraging to the student of human development as the desire, which most men and all communities manifest at all times, to associate with their actions at least the appearance of moral right.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“No community embarks on a great enterprise without fortifying itself with the belief that from some points of view its motives are lofty and disinterested. It is an involuntary tribute, the humble tribute of imperfect beings, to the eternal temples of Truth and Beauty.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“Fanaticism is not a cause of war. It is the means which helps savage peoples to fight. It is the spirit which enables them to combine—the great common object before which all personal or tribal disputes become insignificant.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan

“Since any armed movement against an established Government can be justified only by success, strength is an important revolutionary virtue.”
― Winston S. Churchill, The River War An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan