27 quotes
The people of England have been led in Mesopotamia into a trap from which it will be hard to escape with dignity and honor.
Do not try to do too much with your own hands.
Twenty-Seven Articles (1917)
Some of the evil of my tale may have been inherent in our circumstances.
Seven Pillars of Wisdom (1922)
To have news value is to have a tin can tied to one’s tail.
This creed of the desert seemed inexpressible in words, and indeed in thought.
Seven Pillars of Wisdom (1922)
Freedom is enjoyed when you are so well armed, or so turbulent, or inhabit a country so thorny that the expense of your neighbour's occupying you is greater than the profit.
The Bedouin could not look for God within him: he was too sure that he was within God.
Seven Pillars of Wisdom (1922)
Nine-tenths of tactics are certain, and taught in books: but the irrational tenth is like the kingfisher flashing across the pool, and that is the test of generals.
The Evolution of A Revolt (1920)
All our subject provinces to me were not worth one dead Englishman.
Seven Pillars of Wisdom (1922)
Merit is no qualification for freedom.
All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible.
I've been & am absurdly over-estimated. There are no supermen & I'm quite ordinary, & will say so whatever the artistic results. In that point I'm one of the few people who tell the truth about myself.
Letter in T.E. Lawrence: The Selected Letters (1989)
Isn't it true that the fault of birth rests somewhat on the child? I believe it's we who led our parents on to bear us, and it's our unborn children who make our flesh itch.
Letter in T.E. Lawrence: The Selected Letters (1989)
Feisal asked me if I would wear Arab clothes like his own while in the camp. I should find it better for my own part, since it was a comfortable dress in which to live Arab-fashion as we must do.
Seven Pillars of Wisdom (1922)
Arabia for the Arabs, Judea for the Jews, and Armenia for the Armenians.
Then rose up the horror which would make civilized man shun justice like a plague if he had not the needy to serve him as hangmen for wages.
Seven Pillars of Wisdom (1922)
By them one saw vividly how great it was to be their kin, and English. And we were casting them by thousands into the fire to the worst of deaths, not to win the war but that the corn and rice and oil of Mesopotamia might be ours.
Seven Pillars of Wisdom (1922)
An opinion can be argued with; a conviction is best shot. The logical end of a war of creeds is the final destruction of one, and Salammbo is the classical text-book instance.
The Evolution of A Revolt (1920)
The printing press is the greatest weapon in the armory of the modern commander...
The Evolution of A Revolt (1920)
Feisal asked me if I would wear Arab clothes like his own while in the camp… I agreed at once, very gladly; for army uniform was abominable when camel-riding …