House of Commons, 13 May 1901, Hansard vol. 93 col. 1572. http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1901/may/13/army-organisation
Early career years (1898–1929)
Context: In former days, when wars arose from individual causes, from the policy of a Minister or the passion of a King, when they were fought by small regular armies of professional soldiers, and when their course was retarded by the difficulties of communication and supply, and often suspended by the winter season, it was possible to limit the liabilities of the combatants. But now, when mighty populations are impelled on each other, each individual severally embittered and inflamed—when the resources of science and civilisation sweep away everything that might mitigate their fury, a European war can only end in the ruin of the vanquished and the scarcely less fatal commercial dislocation and exhaustion of the conquerors. Democracy is more vindictive than Cabinets. The wars of peoples will be more terrible than those of kings.
“They were more than kings, now they are less than slaves.”
Ils etaient plus que rois; ils sont moindres qu'esclaves.
Sertorius, act III, scene i
Sertorius describes Roman citizens after they had fallen under tyranny.
Sertorius (1662)
“War stories aren't really anything more than stories about people anyway.”
Dispatches (1977)
1860s, 1864, Letter to the City of Atlanta (September 1864)
Source: Memoirs of General W.T. Sherman
Context: You cannot qualify war in harsher terms than I will. War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it; and those who brought war into our country deserve all the curses and maledictions a people can pour out. I know I had no hand in making this war, and I know I will make more sacrifices today than any of you to secure peace. But you cannot have peace and a division of our country. If the United States submits to a division now, it will not stop
Context: You cannot qualify war in harsher terms than I will. War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it; and those who brought war into our country deserve all the curses and maledictions a people can pour out. I know I had no hand in making this war, and I know I will make more sacrifices today than any of you to secure peace. But you cannot have peace and a division of our country. If the United States submits to a division now, it will not stop, but will go on until we reap the fate of Mexico, which is eternal war. The United States does and must assert its authority, wherever it once had power; for, if it relaxes one bit to pressure, it is gone, and I believe that such is the national feeling.
pg. 49
The Sports and Pastimes of the People of England (1801), Danes
Source: The Way of All Flesh (1903), Ch. 26
“Beware
At war
Or at peace,
More people die
Of unenlightened self-interest
Than of any other disease”
Captain Richard Sharpe, p. 110
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Battle (1995)
Je vois sur leurs nobles fronts le sceau du Seigneur, car ils sont nés rois de la terre bien mieux que ceux qui la possèdent pour l'avoir payée.
Of peasants, in La Mare au diable, ch. 2 (1851); Frank Hunter Potter (trans.) The Haunted Pool (New York: Dodd, Mead, 1895) p. 25
