Defeat Is An Orphan Quotes

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Victory has a hundred fathers and defeat is an orphan. [News conference, April 21 1961]
John F. Kennedy
Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan.
Raymond E. Feist (Jimmy the Hand (Legends of the Riftwar, #3))
John Kennedy once remarked that “victory has a thousand fathers and defeat is an orphan.
William Manchester (American Caesar: Douglas MacArthur, 1880-1964)
If “defeat is an orphan,” the old saying goes, “victory has a thousand fathers,
Doris Kearns Goodwin (Leadership: In Turbulent Times)
Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan.
Merrill R. Chapman (In Search of Stupidity: Over Twenty Years of High Tech Marketing Disasters)
Victory has a hundred fathers and defeat is an orphan.
Galeazzo Ciano
Success has a thousand proud fathers, while defeat is an orphan to all.
Shane Palmer
A little while ago, I stood by the grave of the old Napoleon—a magnificent tomb of gilt and gold, fit almost for a dead deity—and gazed upon the sarcophagus of rare and nameless marble, where rest at last the ashes of that restless man. I leaned over the balustrade and thought about the career of the greatest soldier of the modern world. I saw him walking upon the banks of the Seine, contemplating suicide. I saw him at Toulon—I saw him putting down the mob in the streets of Paris—I saw him at the head of the army of Italy—I saw him crossing the bridge of Lodi with the tri-color in his hand—I saw him in Egypt in the shadows of the pyramids—I saw him conquer the Alps and mingle the eagles of France with the eagles of the crags. I saw him at Marengo—at Ulm and Austerlitz. I saw him in Russia, where the infantry of the snow and the cavalry of the wild blast scattered his legions like winter's withered leaves. I saw him at Leipsic in defeat and disaster—driven by a million bayonets back upon Paris—clutched like a wild beast—banished to Elba. I saw him escape and retake an empire by the force of his genius. I saw him upon the frightful field of Waterloo, where Chance and Fate combined to wreck the fortunes of their former king. And I saw him at St. Helena, with his hands crossed behind him, gazing out upon the sad and solemn sea. I thought of the orphans and widows he had made—of the tears that had been shed for his glory, and of the only woman who ever loved him, pushed from his heart by the cold hand of ambition. And I said I would rather have been a French peasant and worn wooden shoes. I would rather have lived in a hut with a vine growing over the door, and the grapes growing purple in the kisses of the autumn sun. I would rather have been that poor peasant with my loving wife by my side, knitting as the day died out of the sky—with my children upon my knees and their arms about me—I would rather have been that man and gone down to the tongueless silence of the dreamless dust, than to have been that imperial impersonation of force and murder, known as 'Napoleon the Great.
Robert G. Ingersoll (The Liberty Of Man, Woman And Child)
Everybody's experience of life is a profound lesson and one which is very useful. In the old days, wise men educated themselves through much study. They still do even now. Besides, every nation grows up by experiencing glory and shame, victory and defeat, and learning through its own experience and the experience of others. If it is incapable of doing so, then it becomes subjective and complacent, sufficient unto itself and isolated from the rest of the world like an orphan who cannot relate to society or its prevailing discipline.
Bui Tin (Following Ho Chi Minh: Memoirs of a North Vietnamese Colonel)
I think it would be no bad thing if boys like you all grew up with a bit of everything. We might all treat each other a good deal better then. Be less of these wars for one thing. Oh yes. Perhaps one day, all these conflicts will end, and it won’t be because of great statesmen or churches or organisations like this one. It’ll be because people have changed. They’ll be like you, Puffin. More a mixture. So why not become a mongrel? It’s healthy.” “But if I did, everything might . . .” I stopped. “Everything might what, Puffin?” “Like that blind there”—I pointed—“if the twine broke. Everything might scatter.” Uncle Philip stared at the blind I had indicated. Then he rose, went to the window and touched it gently. “Everything might scatter. You might be right. I suppose it’s something we can’t easily get away from. People need to feel they belong. To a nation, to a race. Otherwise, who knows what might happen? This civilisation of ours, perhaps it’ll just collapse. And everything scatter, as you put it.” He sighed, as though I had just defeated him in an argument.
Kazuo Ishiguro (When We Were Orphans)
And so being a Negro in America is not a comfortable existence. It means being a part of the company of the bruised, the battered, the scarred and the defeated. Being a Negro in America means trying to smile when you want to cry. It means trying to hold on to physical life amid psychological death. It means the pain of watching your children grow up with clouds of inferiority in their mental skies. It means having your legs cut off, and then being condemned for being a cripple. It means seeing your mother and father spiritually murdered by the slings and arrows of daily exploitation, and then being hated for being an orphan. Being a Negro in America means listening to suburban politicians talk eloquently against open housing while arguing in the same breath that they are not racists. It means being harried by day and haunted by night by a nagging sense of nobodyness and constantly fighting to be saved from the poison of bitterness. It means the ache and anguish of living in so many situations where hopes unborn have died. After 348 years racial injustice is still the Negro’s burden and America’s shame.
Martin Luther King Jr. (Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?)
You seem surprised to find us here,’ the man said. ‘I am,’ I said. ‘I wasn’t expecting to find anyone.’ ‘We are everywhere,’ the man said. ‘We are all over the country.’ ‘Forgive me,’ I said, ‘but I don’t understand. Who do you mean by we?’ ‘Jewish refugees.’ [...] ‘Is this your land?’ I asked him. ‘Not yet,’ he said. ‘You mean you are hoping to buy it?’ He looked at me in silence for a while. Then he said, ‘The land is at present owned by a Palestinian farmer but he has given us permission to live here. He has also allowed us some fields so that we can grow our own food.’ ‘So where do you go from here?’ I asked him. ‘You and all your orphans?’ ‘We don’t go anywhere,’ he said, smiling through his black beard. ‘We stay here.’ ‘Then you will all become Palestinians,’ I said. ‘Or perhaps you are that already.’ He smiled again, presumably at the naïvety of my questions. ‘No,’ the man said, ‘I do not think we will become Palestinians.’ ‘Then what will you do?’ ‘You are a young man who is flying aeroplanes,’ he said, ‘and I do not expect you to understand our problems.’ ‘What problems?’ I asked him. The young woman put two mugs of coffee on the table as well as a tin of condensed milk that had two holes punctured in the top. The man dripped some milk from the tin into my mug and stirred it for me with the only spoon. He did the same for his own coffee and then took a sip. ‘You have a country to live in and it is called England,’ he said. ‘Therefore you have no problems.’ ‘No problems!’ I cried. ‘England is fighting for her life all by herself against virtually the whole of Europe! We’re even fighting the Vichy French and that’s why we’re in Palestine right now! Oh, we’ve got problems all right!’ I was getting rather worked up. I resented the fact that this man sitting in his fig grove said that I had no problems when I was getting shot at every day. ‘I’ve got problems myself’, I said, ‘in just trying to stay alive.’ ‘That is a very small problem,’ the man said. ‘Ours is much bigger.’ I was flabbergasted by what he was saying. He didn’t seem to care one bit about the war we were fighting. He appeared to be totally absorbed in something he called ‘his problem’ and I couldn’t for the life of me make it out. ‘Don’t you care whether we beat Hitler or not?’ I asked him. ‘Of course I care. It is essential that Hitler be defeated. But that is only a matter of months and years. Historically, it will be a very short battle. Also it happens to be England’s battle. It is not mine. My battle is one that has been going on since the time of Christ.’ ‘I am not with you at all,’ I said. I was beginning to wonder whether he was some sort of a nut. He seemed to have a war of his own going on which was quite different to ours. I still have a very clear picture of the inside of that hut and of the bearded man with the bright fiery eyes who kept talking to me in riddles. ‘We need a homeland,’ the man was saying. ‘We need a country of our own. Even the Zulus have Zululand. But we have nothing.’ ‘You mean the Jews have no country?’ ‘That’s exactly what I mean,’ he said. ‘It’s time we had one.’ ‘But how in the world are you going to get yourselves a country?’ I asked him. ‘They are all occupied. Norway belongs to the Norwegians and Nicaragua belongs to the Nicaraguans. It’s the same all over.’ ‘We shall see,’ the man said, sipping his coffee. The dark-haired woman was washing up some plates in a basin of water on another small table and she had her back to us. ‘You could have Germany,’ I said brightly. ‘When we have beaten Hitler then perhaps England would give you Germany.’ ‘We don’t want Germany,’ the man said. ‘Then which country did you have in mind?’ I asked him, displaying more ignorance than ever. ‘If you want something badly enough,’ he said, ‘and if you need something badly enough, you can always get it.’ [...]‘You have a lot to learn,’ he said. ‘But you are a good boy. You are fighting for freedom. So am I.
Roald Dahl (Going Solo (Roald Dahl's Autobiography, #2))
He made a costly error in judgement and sent an entire regiment into a virtual slaughterhouse. It happens frequently. Officers risk their troops' lives for the sake of a promotion. Not my father. He valued the life of every man under his command, from his officers to the humblest fresh recruit. When he realized what had happened, he was devastated. He couldn't ever forget that his error had cost the lives of so many men, created so many widows and orphans..." "But, Lyon, measured against his valor, one mistake is forgivable." "To us, yes. Not to him. He was sickened that the battle was hailed as one of the turning points of the war. He was decorated for it. It was considered a great victory, but it defeated him as a soldier, as a man. When he came home and was hailed a hero, he couldn't stand the conflict within himself. He didn't feel like a hero. He felt like a traitor." "That can't be!" "Not a traitor to his country, but to the men who had trusted his judgement and leadership. It was a conflict he never could reconcile, so he retired from the Army and came here and shut out the world and all reminders of the lie he was living." They were quiet for a moment before she said,"No one would have thrown stones at him, Lyon. he was a respected man, a hero, a leader at a time in history when America needed heroes and leaders. It was a battleground that spread out for miles. Admist all the chaos he may have thought he made a mistake when he actually didn't." "I know that, Andy, and you know that, but since the time I was old enough to understand his reclusiveness, I was never able to convince him of it. He died still regretting that one day in his life as though he had live no other. It didn't matter what the public would have thought if they had known. He judged himself more severely than anyone else could have." "How tragic for him. He was such a lovely man, Lyon. Such a lovely man.
Sandra Brown (Prime Time)
Victory has a thousand fathers and defeat is an orphan.
Anonymous
Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan.
John F. Kennedy
In Isaiah 9:2 and Matthew 4;16, we are told that in the birth of Jesus, "the people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned." But, you may say, if Jesus is the light of the world, why when he came into the world did he not do something about the suffering and darkness? Children still die premature and horrible deaths. The poor are still downtrodden. Young fathers still die in accidents, leaving widows and orphans to fend for themselves. There are still wars and rumours of wars. Why didn't he stop it all? But what if when Jesus came to earth he had not died young but had come to put down injustice and end evil? What would the result have been for us? Remember Tolkien's dictum: "Always after a defeat and a respite...evil takes another shape and grows again." He's right. Consider the scientific and technological advances that have brought untold benefits in health care and communication. The communication revolution has even been credited with bringing down the Iron Curtain and ending the Cold War. Yet many well-informed people now are afraid that terrorists will use that technology to bring down whole sectors of the electronic grid and wipe out trillions in wealth and bring on a world-wide depression. Nuclear energy is also a great source of power when harnessed properly, yet we know the likelihood of nuclear proliferation and nuclear terrorism. When a new development pushes back evil in one form, evil always finds a way to use that development to bring itself home to us in new shapes and forms. Why? It is because the evil and darkness of this world comes to a great degree from within us. Martin Luther taught that human nature is curved in on itself. We are so instinctively and profoundly self-centered that we don't believe we are. And this curved-in-ness is a source of a vast amount of the suffering and evil we experience, from the violence and genocides in the headlines down to the reason your marriage is so painful.
Timothy J. Keller
There are times today when Rachel looks at Zach and sees an effusion, she sees him in colours of yellow and blue, sun and sky. She sees the yellow crew-neck jumper and blue jeans the boy of eight years old appeared in the day he came to Chelsea from the Coram Family via the two or three previous fosterers who returned him there, defeated, pronouncing him uncommunicative and maladroit in the extreme, animal, said one; unruly. So why this boy? For Katya the fractious? Of all the orphan boys in the world, why him? Of all potential mothers, why Katya? What did she see? Everyone has a part and a destiny. Rachel remembers the yellow jumper the boy rarely removed, even after the family shopping spree for a new wardrobe at Harrods followed by lunch in a restaurant with napkins large as small tablecloths, and heavy cutlery and wine for Katya and Lev and a pervasive daunting hush. Zach had never been to a restaurant before and chose spaghetti, because he knew what it was. He ate it with knife and fork. On the day he arrived in Chelsea, he stopped in the vestibule to slip his feet from lace-ups without undoing the bows, removing his shoes with institutional efficiency, left hand still held in Katya's right. Rachel sees that boy still, blue and yellow. Sky and sun.
Emma Richler (Be My Wolff)
victory has a hundred fathers, and defeat is an orphan.
Douglas Horne (JFK’s War with the National Security Establishment: Why Kennedy Was Assassinated)
There are many stories of war to tell. You will hear them all. But remember among those who were lost, some made it through. Among the dragons there will always be heroes. Even there. Even then. And of those tales ending in defeat, tales of death and orphans wandering among the ruined, some ended the other way too.
Wayétu Moore (The Dragons, the Giant, the Women: A Memoir)
Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan.
Albert Goodman (Greatest Inspirational Quotes: 1000 Days of Inspiring Quotes and Contemplations to Discover Your Inner Strength and Transform Your Life)
Victory has a thousand feathers, but defeat is an orphan.
John F. Kennedy
Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan.” —President John F. Kennedy
Hourly History (Che Guevara: A Life From Beginning to End (Revolutionaries))
Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan,
Chris Whipple (The Spymasters: How the CIA Directors Shape History and the Future)
Victory has a hundred fathers, and defeat is an orphan.
David M. Rubenstein (How to Lead: Wisdom from the World's Greatest CEOs, Founders, and Game Changers)
Victory has a hundred fathers, but defeat is an orphan
John F. Kennedy
has many fathers, but defeat is an orphan.”  ~  John F. Kennedy
Mercedes King (O! Jackie)