“If your enemy offers you two targets, strike at a third.”

—  Robert Jordan , book Crossroads of Twilight

Source: Crossroads of Twilight

Last update Aug. 2, 2022. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "If your enemy offers you two targets, strike at a third." by Robert Jordan?
Robert Jordan photo
Robert Jordan 305
American writer 1948–2007

Related quotes

Miyamoto Musashi photo

“The primary thing when you take a sword in your hands is your intention to cut the enemy, whatever the means. Whenever you parry, hit, spring, strike or touch the enemy's cutting sword, you must cut the enemy in the same movement. It is essential to attain this. If you think only of hitting, springing, striking or touching the enemy, you will not be able actually to cut him.”

Miyamoto Musashi (1584–1645) Japanese martial artist, writer, artist

Go Rin No Sho (1645), The Water Book

“Hatred is an essential part of war. During the conflict it is regarded as treason to "love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you." In war, the enemy are regarded as targets, not as sons of God.”

Kirby Page (1890–1957) American clergyman

"What is War?" (1924)

Yagyū Munenori photo

“A stroke of the sword that does not hit its target is the sword stroke of death; you reach over it to strike the winning blow.”

Yagyū Munenori (1571–1646) samurai and daimyo of the early Edo period

A Hereditary Book on the Art of War (1632)
Context: A stroke of the sword that does not hit its target is the sword stroke of death; you reach over it to strike the winning blow. Your adversary's initiative having missed its mark, you turn the tables around and get the jump on your adversary.

“Worse than thieves, murderers, or cannibals, those who offer compromise slow you and sap your vitality while pretending to be your friends. They are not your friends. Compromisers are the enemies of all humanity, the enemies of life itself. Compromisers are the enemies of everything important, sacred, and true.”

L. Neil Smith (1946) American writer

"Am I the NRA?" collected in Lever Action (2001) and republished online in 2007 http://www.ncc-1776.org/tle2007/tle401-20070114-03.html.

Malcolm X photo

“A ballot is like a bullet. You don’t throw your ballots until you see a target, and if that target is not within your reach, keep your ballot in your pocket.”

Malcolm X (1925–1965) American human rights activist

Source: The Ballot or the Bullet (1964), Speech in Cleveland, Ohio (April 3, 1964)
Context: The political philosophy of black nationalism means that the black man should control the politics and the politicians in his own community; no more. The black man in the black community has to be re-educated into the science of politics so he will know what politics is supposed to bring him in return. Don’t be throwing out any ballots. A ballot is like a bullet. You don’t throw your ballots until you see a target, and if that target is not within your reach, keep your ballot in your pocket.

Ulysses S. Grant photo

“The art of war is simple enough. Find out where your enemy is. Get at him as soon as you can. Strike him as hard as you can, and keep moving on.”

Ulysses S. Grant (1822–1885) 18th President of the United States

Statement to John Hill Brinton, at the start of his Tennessee River Campaign, early 1862, as quoted in Personal Memoirs of John H. Brinton, Major and Surgeon U.S.V., 1861-1865 (1914) by John Hill Brinton, p. 239.
1860s

Gautama Buddha photo

“Sensual passions are your first enemy.
Your second is called Discontent.
Your third is Hunger & Thirst.
Your fourth is called Craving.
Fifth is Sloth & Drowsiness.
Sixth is called Terror.
Your seventh is Uncertainty.
Hypocrisy & Stubbornness, your eighth.
Gains, Offerings, Fame, & Status wrongly gained,
and whoever would praise self
& disparage others.
That, Namuci, is your enemy,
the Dark One's commando force.
A coward can't defeat it,
but one having defeated it
gains bliss.”

Gautama Buddha (-563–-483 BC) philosopher, reformer and the founder of Buddhism

Source: Pali Canon, Sutta Pitaka, Khuddaka Nikaya (Minor Collection), (Suttas falling down), Sutta 3.2. Padhana Sutta

Shaka photo

“Strike an enemy once and for all. Let him cease to exist as a tribe or he will live to fly in your throat again.”

Shaka (1787–1828) leader of the Zulu Kingdom

Advice to King Dingiswayo on the treatment of the defeated Ndwandwe, reported in Shaka Zulu : The Rise of the Zulu Empire (1955) by E. A. Ritter, p. 50

Orson Scott Card photo

“It (i. e., advertising) was like horoscopes—enough blind stabs and some of them are bound to strike a target.”

Orson Scott Card Ender's Game hexalogy

Page 185
Ender's Game series, First Meetings in the Enderverse (2003), Investment Counselor

Robert A. Heinlein photo

“Your enemy is never a villain in his own eyes. Keep this in mind; it may offer a way to make him your friend. If not, you can kill him without hate — and quickly.”

Robert A. Heinlein (1907–1988) American science fiction author

Related topics