War Quotes
Two of the best-known lines about war are flagged as misattributed, and both stories are worth knowing.
“In war, truth is the first casualty” is credited to Aeschylus, and sometimes to the US senator Hiram Johnson. It is not in his speeches. The first recorded use Wikiquote found is by Philip Snowden in July 1916, introducing a book by E. D. Morel, and he wrote “it has been said”, so it was probably already going around. Samuel Johnson made the same point in The Idler in 1758, about “the falsehoods which interest dictates and credulity encourages”.
“Men grow tired of sleep, love, singing and dancing, sooner than of war” is credited to Homer, and it is a misquotation of the Iliad (Book 13). In the original, most men prefer those things to war. It is the Trojans who can never get enough of fighting.
An army abroad is of little use unless there are prudent counsels at home.
War is regarded as nothing but the continuation of state policy with other means.
Hence it happened that all the armed prophets conquered, all the unarmed perished.
It is now as in the days of yore when the sword ruled all things.
Give the enemy not only a road for flight, but also a means of defending it.
The proper qualities of a general are judgment and deliberation.
Let war be so carried on that no other object may seem to be sought but the acquisition of peace.
Therefore, whoever wishes for peace, let him prepare for war.