Category: Quotations

Churchill on the Century

Churchill on the Century

Who here is in their For­ties? Are you as pes­simistic as he was?

Win­ston Churchill was 48 when he penned some “Reflec­tions on the Cen­tu­ry,” which may arrest you with their prescience—and their eerie relevance.

His words below are in his orig­i­nal “speech form.” This is the way they were set out on the notes he car­ried with him, how­ev­er well he mem­o­rized his lines. They appear in this style in my col­lec­tion of quo­ta­tions, Churchill by Him­self, but dif­fer from the way you may have encoun­tered them in oth­er books:

 

What a dis­ap­point­ment [this] cen­tu­ry has been.……

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Zürich +70: Churchill on Europe

Zürich +70: Churchill on Europe

Zürich, 19 September 1946

Scarce­ly more than a year since fight­ing had end­ed in Europe, Churchill spoke at Zürich Uni­ver­si­ty. There he stunned his audi­ence with words that per­haps only he was able to say at that time:

I am now going to say some­thing that will aston­ish you. The first step in the re-cre­ation of the Euro­pean fam­i­ly must be a part­ner­ship between France and Ger­many. In this way only can France recov­er the moral lead­er­ship of Europe. There can be no revival of Europe with­out a spir­i­tu­al­ly great France and a spir­i­tu­al­ly great Germany. Zürich, 19 September 2016 Sev­en­ty years to the day after Churchill’s Zürich speech, Zürich Uni­ver­si­ty spon­sored a dis­tin­guished sem­i­nar.…

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Cars & Churchill: Blood, Sweat & Gears (2) Daimlers…

Cars & Churchill: Blood, Sweat & Gears (2) Daimlers…

Hav­ing writ­ten about cars and Win­ston Churchill for fifty years, I final­ly pro­duced a piece on them both. From exot­i­ca like Daim­ler, Napi­er and Rolls-Royce to more pro­sa­ic makes like Austin, Hum­ber and Wolse­ley, the sto­ry was three decades in com­ing. I am sat­is­fied that it is now complete.

Part 2, con­tin­ued from Part 1: Excerpt only. For foot­notes,  all illus­tra­tions and a ros­ter of Churchill’s cars, see The Auto­mo­bile, (UK), August 2016. A pdf of the arti­cle is avail­able upon request: click here.

Wolseley to Austin

In the ear­ly 1930s Churchill switched from Wolse­ley to Austin cars: small fours and big six­es.…

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Cars & Churchill: Blood, Sweat & Gears (1) Mors the Pity

Cars & Churchill: Blood, Sweat & Gears (1) Mors the Pity

“You fool!” the policeman shouted. Then he “swore most richly for some seconds.” Churchill’s head hung. “He did have the civic sense to say he was sorry,” Thompson continued. “...the matchless voice of the man identified him at once to the constable.” ‘Sorry, Mr. Churchill,’ the policeman apologised. "Then the majesty of the constable’s office and the disgusting guilt of the violator brought forth, in gentle sarcasm, a caution that withered Churchill and kept him silent clear to the Channel. ‘Do try to stay in the road, sir.’”

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Brexit: Britannia Waives the Rules

Brexit: Britannia Waives the Rules

Brex­it after­math, June 2016: In vot­ing to leave the Euro­pean Union, Britain has opt­ed to become anoth­er Nor­way. One of the most pros­per­ous and con­tent­ed coun­tries in the world, Nor­way does fine with its own laws, cur­ren­cy, and trade agree­ments, includ­ing a good one with the EU. It is hard­ly a bad model.

Short-term troubles

The gnash­ing of teeth over the upset Brex­it vic­to­ry resounds around the world. For awhile, chaos will attend finan­cial mar­kets, and the pound will take a dip (boost­ing British exports).

The Scots vot­ed against Brex­it, though not in the num­bers pre­dict­ed.…

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Trump on Women: Should’ve Said Something Else

Trump on Women: Should’ve Said Something Else

Some­thing Mr. Trump said remind­ed me of a piece Win­ston Churchill wrote in 1947: The Dream. But he might not entire­ly rel­ish the reminder. (And this is not, believe me, any attempt to com­pare Trump to Churchill.)

The Dream is a styl­ish short sto­ry about Churchill’s imag­i­nary con­ver­sa­tion with the ghost of his father, Lord Ran­dolph Churchill, who died in 1895. In a touch­ing, rather sad con­ver­sa­tion, the 73-year-old Win­ston relates to the 45-year-old Ran­dolph all that has hap­pened since 1895, with­out dis­clos­ing the roles he him­self had played.

They dis­cuss elec­tions. Lord Ran­dolph asks, “What is the franchise?”

“Uni­ver­sal,” his son replies.…

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“Boneless Wonder” vs. “Dodgy Dave”

“Boneless Wonder” vs. “Dodgy Dave”

"I remember when I was a child, being taken to the celebrated Barnum’s circus, which contained an exhibition of freaks and monstrosities, but the exhibit on the programme which I most desired to see was the one described as 'The Boneless Wonder.' My parents judged that that spectacle would be too revolting and demoralising for my youthful eyes, and I have waited 50 years to see the Boneless Wonder sitting on the Treasury Bench." —WSC, 1931

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Bombing Japan: Churchill’s View

Bombing Japan: Churchill’s View

Scott John­son of Pow­er­line (“Why We Dropped the Bomb,” 13 April) kind­ly links an old col­umn of his quot­ing an old one of mine with ref­er­ence to Pres­i­dent Obama’s vis­it to Hiroshi­ma and the atom bomb­ing of Japan.

John­son links a lec­ture by Pro­fes­sor Williamson Mur­ray, which is worth con­sid­er­ing, along with Paul Fussell’s clas­sic essay in The New Repub­lic, “Thank God for the Atom Bomb,” which makes you think, though some con­sid­er it a rant. Fussell wrote:

John Ken­neth Gal­braith is per­suad­ed that the Japan­ese would have sur­ren­dered sure­ly by Novem­ber with­out an inva­sion.…

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Senator Cruz: Minor Misquote, Major Misinterpretation

Senator Cruz: Minor Misquote, Major Misinterpretation

Ted Cruz, speak­ing on 5 April, “sparked an out­cry” by mis­quot­ing Churchill: “If we open a quar­rel between the past and the present, Cruz intoned, “we risk the future.”

The Lon­don Dai­ly Tele­graph report­ed: The ref­er­ences drew a swift—and fierce—reaction from social media.”  Social media is not a like­ly place to con­tem­plate the fine points of his­to­ry. It wasn’t in this case, as you can read in the news­pa­per article.

What Cruz said was “…risk the future.” For Churchill it was more than risk. In his “Finest Hour” speech, 18 June 1940, Churchill told Par­lia­ment: “If we open a quar­rel between the past and the present we shall find that we have lost the future.”…

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Lehrman on Churchill and Lincoln

Lehrman on Churchill and Lincoln

Lewis E. Lehrman, co-founder of the Gilder Lehrman Insti­tute of Amer­i­can His­to­ry, offers a com­pelling two-part com­par­i­son of Abra­ham Lin­coln and Win­ston Churchill at the Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project. (To read in entire­ty, start here.)

Mr. Lehrman is author of Lin­coln at Peo­ria: The Turn­ing Point (2008) and Lin­coln “by lit­tles” (2013). Unique­ly among the Lin­coln schol­ars I’ve heard on Churchill, he has as fine a grasp of the Eng­lish states­man as he does the Amer­i­can pres­i­dent. He tells me he regards each as the out­stand­ing fig­ure of his respec­tive cen­tu­ry. No argu­ment there.

1. Lehrman on Preparation for Greatness

Excerpt: Pres­i­dent Lin­coln and Prime Min­is­ter Churchill found them­selves chal­lenged by wars of nation­al sur­vival.…

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